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I LIBRARY OF CONGRESS. 
*V^ 

flXJTED STATES OF AMERICA.! 




INORGANIC, MINERAL, OR DEAD FORMS 
OF MATTER. 



The single squares repre- 
sent atoms of the simple or 
elementary substances of 
chemistry : — those which 
cannot be separated or de- 
composed into different 
kinds of matter. 



The four kinds of mat- 
ter represented by these 
squares compose nineteen 
twentieths, by weight, of 
our own bodies, and of all 
plants, and the whole of 
the atmosphere and ocean. 
Oxygen alone constitutes 
one half the weight of the 
earth's solid crust, eight 
ninths of all its waters, « 
one fifth of the air. 



OxYGEN 

Gas, 8. 



These chemical elements \ 
have a tendency to com- 
bine with each other to 
form compounds. They al- 
ways unite in pairs. "The 
lines which meet at the 
right represent chemical 
combination. Thus carbon 
and oxygen unite, ns the 
lines shew, to form carbo- 
nic acid. Oxygen and hy- 
drogen are seen to fot 
water ; hydrogen and 



Hydkoqkn 
Gas, 1. 



Whenever these ele- 
ments combine, it is al- 
ways in certain fixed 
anal definite propor- 
tions by weight. The 
area or size of the 
squares indicates these 
proportions. One oz. 
of hydrogen, for exam- 
ple, unites with eijjht 
of oxygen to form nine 
ounces of water. 



These lour elements form 
the main food of all plants; 
yet they enter the plant not 
in the simple condition, but 
in the compound form of 
carbonic acid, water, and 



Carbonic Acid. 



They all exist in the 
air, and may enter 
the plant through its 
leaves, or be washed 
down and enter the 
roots. Under the in- 
fluence of forces which 
radiate from the sun, 
heat, light, and the ac- 
tivic or chemical force 
— the motive powers 
of vegetable growth — 
these compounds are 
converted into the vi- 
tal or organized prin- 
ciples of plants. 




Out of carbonic acid 
and water alone, as the 
lines show, plants form 
n large class of alimen- 
tary substances, sugar, 
starch, gum, vegetable 
acids, and the fats and 
oils, which are seen to 
be included within the 
larger brace. They 
contain no nitrogen, 
and are hence called 
turn - nitrogenized ali- 
ments Out of carbo- 
nic aoid, water and am- 
monia — another class 
of aliments, the nitro- 
d — are seen to 
e produced. 



Nitrogen 
Gas, 14. 



These four chemical ele- 
ments have been termed 
Organogeny which means 
generators of organization, 
because they form the chief 
mass of all living things. 



(■■■Ml 

Ammonia. 

These are termed binary 
compounds, because they 
contain but two kinds of 
matter, and being so simple 
in their composition, they 
are of a very permanent 
and unchangeable nature. 



ORGANIZED COMPO UNDS OF PLANTS, 

THE ALIMENTARY PRINCIPLES OF 

HUMAN FOOD. 

Compositions of Sugars, Starches, and Gums. 



Sugar 



Composition of the Vegetable Acids. 




411 organic matter is transient in its nature, and returns through 
decomposition back to the dead, unorganized conditions of carbonic 
■Oft water, and ammonia, from which it was originally derived Un 
d«the influence of putrefying nitrogenized matter (ferment), sugar 
decomposed, destroyed, and its elements arrange themselves into 
»•* forms, and give rise to new products. The diagrams show that 
m compound atom of sugar, containing thirty-six elementary atom, 
* troken up and produces two new compounds. It gives rise to four 
atoms of carbonic acid, and two of alcohol. It i, thus seen that alco- 
d.01 ,, „ot found among the alimentary principles of human food, 
wheh are produced by plants; but is « product of their destruction 
hoi " t , I'" !' CS gr ° WtK bUt ° f V'^efacti.c Composition. Alco- 

hol.s the first step ,n a series of decompositions, of descending changes 
si terminate in the restoration of organic matter to the minfrai 
«W. An atom of water taken from alcohol is seen to produce ether 
lb, 1 093 f a „other atom gives defiant, or common illuminating gas- 
«" his. by burning, is wholly converted into carbonic acid and wa- 
ter. In comparing the chemical composition of alcohol with the true 

tLT£Z£Z2fr If 1 b Y een t0 differ f ' om •» ° f "-; 

ensuing pages. ^^ ^ Pr ° Pe, " eS ' " «P , " in «> " *. 



Citric Acid. 

Composition of the Oils and Fats 



llll 



Marganc Acid 



Glycerin 



These protein or al- 
buminous compounds 
are the true elements 
of nutrition, forming 
all the muscle and tis- 
sue of the body. They 
have all a strong ten- 
dency to run into de- 
composition, and pu- 
trefy, under suitable 
circumstances ; and it 
is these which destroy 
the sugar when alco- 
hol is produced. 



Protein Compounds, Gluten, Fibrin. Albumen. 
Casein. 



OF the 

SOURCE AND COMPOSITION 
THE ALIMENTARY PRINCIPLES OF HUMAN FOOD, 

AND 

' THE RELATION OF ALCOHOL THERETO. 
BY EDWARD L. YOUMANS. 

$W Tn understand the principle of the chart, read down the first and second 
columns at the left. Further explanations are contained in the work. _^£j 



ALCOHOL 



AND THE 



CONSTITUTION OF IAN; 



BEING A 



| opkr jitmttifix %ttmd 

OP THE CHEMICAL PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL, AND ITS LEADING EFFECTS 
UPON THE HEALTHY HUMAN CONSTITUTION. 



ILLUSTRATED BY A BEAUTIFULLY COLORED CHEMICAL CHART, 

BT Ma 

EDWARD L. YOUMANS, 

AUTHOR OF THE " CLASS BOOK OF CHEMISTRY. 



NEW YORK: 

FOWLERS AND WELLS, PUBLISHERS, 

Clinton Hall, 131 Nassau Street. 
London: 142 Strand. 
Boston : \ t Philadelphia : 

'No. 142 Washington St. J" 18 5 4. JNo. 231 Arch Street 







Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1853, by 

Edward L. Youmans, 

in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the United States for the 

Southern District of New York. 



EDWARD 0. JENKINS, PRINTER & STEREOTYPER, 
114 Nassau Street, New York. 



PREFACE. 



The following pages will Tbe found to contain a familiar description 
of those scientific facts and principles which illustrate the nature of 
Alcohol, and its influence upon the human constitution. The progress 
of science has made it desirable that such a work should be prepared. 
The science of Organic Chemistry, the Chemistry of plants and animals, 
upon which this question largely depends for elucidation, has been 
greatly advanced within the last few years, which enables us to pre- 
sent many points of the subject with much more clearness and satis- 
faction than was previously possible. 

The work is intended to diffuse a kind of knowledge among the 
people, in which they are too generally deficient. To acquire this infor- 
mation, they must be able to understand what they read ; and I have 
therefore endeavored to present the subject in a style as free as»pos- 
sibie from technical terms, and that may be comprehended, upon 
careful perusal, by all persons of common education, although un- 
taught in science. The principle of the Author's large Chemical 
Chart, which has been approved by the ablest Professors and Teachers 
of the country, as the best method of inculcating rudimentary Chem- 
istry, is now, for the first time, applied to the illustration of a special 
branch of the science. The accompanying diagrams will be found of 
much value in simplifying the subject, and aiding the reader to form 
and retain correct ideas concerning the Chemistry of Food and of 
Alcohol. 

As the question is intrinsically and throughout a scientific one, it 
will be seen that I must explain, as I proceed, so much of Chemistry 
and Physiology as may be needed to illustrate the main topic. Thus, 
in order to understand the true nature and relationships of Alcohol, 



IV PREFACE. 

I found it necessary to explain something of the properties of organ- 
ized substances generally, and especially of that class which comprises 
the alimentary principles of diet ; that I might show how it is that a 
liquid, taken into the stomach, revolutionizes the intellectual nature, 
it became important to set forth, in a clear light, the absolute depend- 
ence of mental operations upon material conditions of the Brain. It 
is hoped that these portions of the work, independent of their bearing 
upon the main subject, will be found far from uninteresting, as they 
cast light upon the means and policy which God, the Infinite Author 
of science, employs in sustaining the daily life of a human being. 

It can hardly be necessary to caution the considerate reader against 
expecting, in this little work, a full discussion of all the topics its 
title may seem to involve. I assigned to myself the task of establish- 
ing and explaining certain important facts and principles, and of 
stating the conclusions to which they lead, in the narrowest compass 
possible. It would have been easy to multiply facts, authorities and 
observations, so as to make a large book ; but who could be found 
with time enough to read it ? 

In the arrangement of the subject I have followed a plan which 
enabled me to present it most effectually to the popular mind, rather 
than one commended by the strictness of its science. 

I am much indebted to the valuable work of that Eminent English 
Physiologist, Dr. Carpenter ; and, in making extracts from it, I have 
taken the liberty of modifying his language, where it seemed too pro- 
fessional. I have made free use, as will be seen, of a capital paper 
by that distinguished physician, Dr. J. W. Francis of New York : and 
would also acknowledge my indebtedness to the able work of Dr. Ray, 
Superintendent of one of the Eastern Lunatic Asylums, on the Medi- 
cal Jurisprudence of Insanity. 

Saratoga Springs, Nov. 1853. 



<&nnttnis. 



Preface. 3 

Chemical Origin, Nature and Properties of Alcohol, . 7 

Influence of Alcohol upon the Digestive Process, . . 28 
Relation of Alcohol to the Constituents of the Tissues. — 

Water. . . . , 31 

Relation of Alcohol to the Constituents of the Tissues. — 

Albumen .37 

Effects of Alcohol upon the Respiration and Circulation, . 44 

Alcohol as a Heat-Producing Agent, 54 

Alcohol as a Stimulant, 57 

Relation of Alcohol to Disease, 62 

Alcohol a Poison, . . .71 

Value of the Brain in the Human Constitution, ... 75 
Exercise of the Brain controlled by Physical Conditions, . 79 
Poisons have a Local Action within the System, . . 89 

Alcohol attracted to the Cerebral Matter. It is a Brain 

Poison, i . . 92 

Brain Disease caused by Alcohol, . . . . * . 96 

Forms of Mental Disorder and Insanity produced by Alcohol, 100 

Intensity of the Appetite for Alcohol, 114 

Responsibility in Drunkenness, . . . . . .117 



ALCOHOL 



AND THE 



CONSTITUTION OF MAN. 



I. CHEMICAL 0EIG-IIS T , NATUKE AND PKO- 
PEETIES OF ALCOHOL. 

1. Origin of the Earth 1 s Vegetation.— The great 
source of all vegetable forms upon the surface of the 
globe, is the atmosphere which surrounds it. Through 
the agency of forces which radiate from the sun, act- 
ing upon gases which compose the air, the vegetable 
world is called into existence. Excepting the slight 
amount of ash left after burning, all plants may be 
looked upon as condensed and solidified air. As the 
atmosphere consists of the same chemical elements 
all over the world, so also do plants ; and as the at- 
mosphere is composed of but four different kinds of 
matter, so, too, is almost the entire vegetable king- 
dom. 

2. Chemical Elements of which Plants are formed. — 
The chief mass of all vegetable substances is made 



8 CHEMICAL OKIGINj VATUKE AND 

up of the four chemical elements — Carbon, Oxygen, 
Hydrogen, and Nitrogen. These are represented upon 
the accompanying chart by square diagrams ; the 
size of the square, in each case, indicating the pro- 
portions by weight in which the elements enter into 
combination with each other. Carbon, which we know 
familiarly as charcoal, is a large element of all living 
or organized substances. Of the four great elements 
which compose living structures, Carbon is the only 
solid. Oxygen is a gas composing one-fifth of the 
air, and distinguished by its powerful attraction for 
other elements. It combines with them with such 
energy as to produce combustion. Fire and burning 
are simply the result of Oxygen violently uniting 
with the elements of which fuel, or burning bodies 
are composed. It can also combine slowly with these 
substances, as in common decay, or in breathing, 
when the Oxygen enters the living body and unites 
with, or slowly burns its elements, thus maintaining 
the temperature of the healthy system at blood heat. 
Hydrogen is a gas not found free in the atmosphere, 
but exists in water, forming one-ninth of its weight. 
Plants have the power of splitting the water-atoms to 
get the Hydrogen, which they put into all the com- 
pounds that they make. When these compounds 
decay or burn, the Hydrogen combines again with the 
Oxygen, forming water. Hydrogen has a very strong 
attraction for Oxygen, and produces an intense heat 



PEOPEETIES OF ALCOHOL. 9 

by combining with it ; so that the richer a compound 
is in Hydrogen, the more heat it yields in burning. 
Nitrogen is a gas which composes about four-fifths of 
the atmosphere. It has feeble attractions towards 
other substances ; unites with them reluctantly, and 
then leaves them so easily, that the compounds it 
forms are of a very changeable nature. 

3. True Office of Vegetation. — It is not in their pure 
or simple state that plants make use of these sub- 
stances to build up their structures, but in the com- 
pound forms of water, carbonic acid, and' ammonia, 
formed, as is seen by the diagrams upon the chart, 
from the four bodies just described. From these 
three substances — the first a neutral body, and the 
two latter violent poisons, when respired by animals — 
the bulk of all vegetation is produced. It is the 
grand office of plants to convert these dead, unorgan- 
ized, and poisonous substances, into living compounds, 
capable of becoming food for the animal races. 
They enter the plant through the roots, dissolved in 
water, or are absorbed from the air by millions of 
microscopic mouths opening upon the surface of the 
leaves. Under the influence of solar light, acting 
upon the green parts of vegetation, they are there de- 
composed, and their atoms re-arranged into new and 
more complex groups, forming the infinitely diversi- 
fied products of vegetable growth. By the subtle 
1* 



10 CHEMICAL ORIGIN, NATURE AND 

synthesis of the sunbeam, noxious and deadly ex- 
halations are transformed into the vital aliment of 
man, — the material for muscle and nerve, and brain. 
To decompose carbonic acid, water, and ammonia, and 
bring their atoms under the influence of new and 
higher attractions, is thus the great purpose of vege- 
tation. The plant is constructive ; it builds together 
dead matter into the condition of life. The chemical 
relations of the dead gaseous matter, and the living 
compounds which are formed from it in the plant, 
are beautifully shown upon the colored chart. 

4. What is Organization? — This construction, or 
building up of living forms and substances, is called 
Organization, because living beings possess Organs by 
which they are enabled to grow ; as, for example, the 
roots and leaves of plants. Organic or Organized 
compounds are such as living beings form within their 
structures out of decomposed mineral matter, which 
may be either gaseous, liquid, or solid. This last 
form of matter is called Inorganic or Unorganized. 
Disorganization is the separation of the atoms of an 
Organized compound into the mineral or Inorganic 
condition. 

5. Alimentary Compounds of Plants. — Although the 
materials which nature employs are so limited and 
simple, yet the products of vegetable construction are 
almost boundless in variety. Of these, but few are 
employed by man as food, and they are all represented 



PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 11 

upon the accompanying chart. The alimentary prin- 
ciples of food., as they are called, are divided into two 
great classes. First, those which we see by the lines 
are formed simply from carbonic acid and water, 
without the aid of ammonia. They hence contain no 
Nitrogen, and are called the non-nitrogenized class of 
aliments. There are, as we see, three groups of them, 
differing in the relative proportions of their elementa- 
ry atoms. In the Sugar and Starch group, the quan- 
tity of Carbon is the same, and there is an equal 
number of Hydrogen and Oxygen atoms. These ex- 
ist in the exact proportion to form water. In compo- 
sition, therefore, this whole group, Starch, Sugar, Lig- 
nin and Gum, are simply charcoal and water. The 
Vegetable acids, which impart a sour flavor to fruits, 
are composed differently. Their Carbon is variable, 
their Hydrogen in small proportion, and their Oxy- 
gen in excess. The family of Fats and Oils are seen 
to differ from both the other groups. Their Hydro- 
gen and Carbon is in large excess, with but little Oxy- 
gen. 

6. Non-nitrogenized or Heat-producing Compounds. — 
This group of aliments is simply designed to be de- 
stroyed (burned) in the animal body for the production 
of heat. They are decomposed by the Oxygen of 
respiration into carbonic acid and water, and are 
hence called " elements of respiration." We see at 
once, from their composition, that the amount of heat 



12 

which they produce must be variable. That depends 
as we have seen, (2,) upon the proportion of Hydro- 
gen and Carbon. The Fats and Oils give most heat, 
the Vegetable Acids least, and the starch group a me- 
dium amount. These are so distributed by nature, as 
to meet the wants and necessities of animals under va- 
rious conditions of season and climate ; as, animal oil 
and blubber, for the polar inhabitants ; acid fruits and 
starches, for those within the tropics ; and these va- 
riously blended, for the occupants of intermediate re- 
gions. The most diverse necessities of animal beings 
are thus amply and fully provided for. 

7. Nitrogenized or true Nutritive Compounds. — The 
second class of alimentary principles, as we see by a 
glance at the diagrams, is formed from Carbonic Acid, 
"Water, and also Ammonia ; it contains Nitrogen, and 
is hence termed the Nitrogenized group of aliments. 
They are called Vegetable Albumen, Vegetable Gluten, 
Vegetable Fibrin, and Vegetable Casein ; and, except- 
ing a small and varying amount of Sulphur and Phos- 
phorus — too small to be accurately determined — they 
are all identical in composition. The use of these 
alimentary compounds is, to be transformed into the 
fabric or tissue of the animal body ; they form its 
structure, and are hence the only true nutritive ali- 
ments (40). Muscular Flesh has the same composition 
as these substances. It contains the same proportion 



PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 13 

of nitrogen. The members of the other group (6) are 
incapable of being con verted into muscle, or the tissue 
of animal flesh. Upon these facts all the ablest Phy- 
siologists are now agreed. 

8. Why are all Organized Compounds so transient f — 
By reference to the chart, and comparing the compo- 
sition of the aliments with substances from which 
they are derived, we see a marked difference of com- 
position. The gases are simple, containing only a 
pair of elements, with but two, three, or four atoms. 
But the substances which the vegetable makes out of 
them are very different. They consist of three or four 
distinct kinds of matter, and large numbers of atoms. 
Their composition is complex. As a consequence of 
this, the former are highly permanent and unchange- 
able, while the latter are prone to change and decom- 
position. The more complicated a machine, the more 
easily is it thrown into disorder. So with chemical 
compounds ; the greater the number of elements and 
atoms they contain, and the more numerous the at- 
tractions brought into play, the easier is their compo- 
sition broken up by disturbing forces. The atoms of 
organic compounds are thrown as it were into a con- 
strained state, by the forces which produce growth ; 
slight causes are, therefore, sufficient to derange the 
nice equilibrium in which they are held, and they re- 
coil back again into simpler and more permanent 
conditions. 



u 



9. Organic Compounds are Reservoirs of Power, resem- 
bling Bent Springs. — This return or relapse of atoms to 
the dead, mineral form, is for the production of heat, 
light, and power. The substances we use in lamps, 
grates, stoves, or under steam boilers, consist of atoms 
which have been thrown into a constrained state by 
the radiant forges of the sun. It is as if the sun had 
wound up the atoms into organic combination. They 
here resemble coiled or bent springs. When the 
proper impulse is communicated, their delicately ad- 
justed affinities are overturned, and the atoms recoil, 
or return to the simple forms of carbonic acid and 
water, — the products of combustion, with the produc- 
tion of illuminating, heating, and mechanical effects. 
The spring returns with force to the relaxed state. 

10. The Philosophical idea of Foods. — Now, alimen- 
tary substances, like all other parts of vegetation, con- 
sist of atoms which have been arranged into groups, 
by the action of solar light and the other impondera- 
ble agents ; but they are also endowed with the capa- 
bility of becoming parts of animal systems, and there, 
in a regulated and peculiar manner, relapsing into the 
decomposed or inorganic form, with the same evolu- 
tion of heat and force. The great office of the animal 
system is thus apparent. In a philosophical point of 
view, it is but a mechanism for the destruction of or- 
ganized matter; and foods are that c J ass of vegetable 



PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 15 

substances which is capable of being used up in this ma- 
chine without injuring it. Gunpowder recoils with- 
vast force from the solid to the gaseous form, and 
although adapted to shatter a rock, or project a bullet, 
it would hardly perform well under a steam boiler. 
But wood and coal are decomposed into the gaseous 
condition, and impart their power under a steam 
boiler, although they are not capable of doing it in 
the animal body ; this may be done by the true ali- 
ments alone. 

11. The recoiling atoms return to the inorganic state 
by different routes. — The relapse of atoms, or their pas- 
sage backward from the organized to the inorganic 
state, takes place under many different circumstances, 
and gives rise to a great variety of products. If 
wood, for example, is allowed to decay in contact 
with air and moisture, a class of substances is formed 
from it, of a totally different nature, termed humus, 
humic acid, ulmin, geine, etc. If allowed to decay 
under water, with total exclusion of air, as occurs in 
ponds and marshes, an inflamable gas is generated, 
with mud and peat. If heated with partial admission 
of air, as in coal-pits, carbonic acid, water, and char- 
coal are produced. If heated with entire exclusion 
of air .destructive distillation), charcoal, tar, pyroligne- 
.ous acid, creosote, and illuminating gas appear. But 
if the wood is burned in the open air, the Oxygen 



16 CHEMICAL ORIGIN, NATURE AND 

seizes upon its Carbon and Hydrogen, which return at 
once to the condition of carbonic acid and water, from 
which the wood was originally derived. In all these 
cases the wood itself is destroyed. The attractions 
that hold together its atoms, in a certain order, which 
constitutes it wood, are broken, and the atoms com- 
bine again in new groups, giving rise to new and 
various substances, which constitute the intermediate 
steps of the disorganizing process. The atoms may- 
return by various routes, but always to the same sim- 
ple condition of carbonic acid and water. 

12. The Nitrogenized compounds easily putrefy. — Of 
all the organized products of nature, the most 
transient and changeable are the nitrogenized ali- 
ments. Under the influence of moisture and Oxygen, 
at common temperatures, they pass rapidly into putre- 
factive decomposition. The reason why meat, blood, 
dough, milk, etc., change their nature, or putrefy so 
speedily is because of the abundant presence of ni- 
trogenized matter in a moist state, which favors putre- 
faction. 

13. Putrefaction communicated to the non-nitrogenized 
aliments. — The non-nitrogenized aliments are of a 
more permanent nature — less liable to decay. Pure 
Woody Fibre, Starch and Sugar, for example, are 
comparatively very enduring; but, when in contact 






PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 17 

with nitrogenized substances, which, are undergoing 
decomposition, they become at once affected and go 
into the same state. The putrefactive condition pass- 
es from one class of substances to another, by a kind 
of infection; as a rotten apple throws a sound one in 
contact with it into the same state, or, as we may sup- 
pose, fire communicated from one burning body to 
another. It is as if the atoms in the spontaneously 
putrifying substance, being in a state of active com- 
motion, communicate their own agitation to sur- 
rounding bodies, and thus overturn the delicately bal- 
anced equilibrium of their composition, establishing a 
new order of attractions, and giving rise to a new 
series of products. 

14. How Alcohol results from putrefaction. Thus, a 
cause of the rapid decay of wood under certain cir- 
cumstances, is the presence of Albumen in its sap. 
The Albumen readily putrefies and imparts its own 
state to the woody substance. The patent kyanizing 
process for preserving wood consists in throwing the 
Albumen of its sap into an unchangeable state. In the 
same manner Sugar is changed. A solution of pure 
Sugar in water remains for any length of time unal- 
tered. But if a nitrogenized substance in process of 
decompostion, as putrefying flesh, blood, cheese, dough, 
or white of egg, be added to a solution of Sugar in 
water, a change promptly occurs, the sugar disappears, 



18 CHEMICAL ORIGIN, NATURE AND 

carbonic acid is produced in large quantities, the 
liquid looses its sweet taste, acquires a peculiar flavor, 
and is found to contain a new substance called Alco- 
hol. 

15. Alcohol comes only from the destruction of Sugar. — 
The nitrogenized substances, which, by their putre- 
faction, induce decomposition in other- compounds, are 
termed ferments; the process is called fermentation. 
In consequence of its common occurrence in the juice 
expressed from the fruit of the vine, it is called the 
vinous fermentation. It proceeds only within a cer- 
tain range of temperature, from 60° to 80° of the 
common thermometer. Below this range, no action 
takes place ; above it, another fermentation sets in, 
called the viscous, in which gummy and mucilaginous 
substances instead of Alcohol, are produced from the 
Sugar. All vegetable juices and other liquids contain- 
ing Sugar are capable of the Yinous or Alcoholic fer- 
mentation, provided they have present, as is usually 
the case, sufficient albuminous matter to produce and 
sustain the action. Thus, the juice of apples, pears, 
peaches, currants, grapes, beets, carrots, parsnips, the 
sweet juices of the cane, corn-stalk, maple, ash, birch, 
butternut, palm tree, cocoanut, and numerous other 
fruits, roots and trees, milk, and various artificial in- 
fusions of Sugar, are capable of fermentation, and are 
employed as sources of Alcohol. There are several 



PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 19 

different kinds of Sugar, although but one variety {grape- 
sugar) is capable of being converted directly into Al- 
cohol. The other kinds must be transformed into 
grape-sugar, before they become susceptible of this 
change. 

16. How Alcohol is obtained from grain. — But the 
chief source of Alcohol is the cereal grains, rye, wheat, 
barley and indian corn ; much is also made from pota- 
toes. Although these contain but very little Sugar, 
yet they consist of a large proportion of Starch, a sub- 
stance which is capable of being converted into Sugar. 
This change is effected naturally in grain and pota- 
toes during the process of sprouting or germination. 
A new substance is produced in the seed at this time, 
called, diastase, which possesses the power of trans- 
forming Starch into Sugar. This principle is made 
available in the operation of malting. Malt is barley, 
or other grain, in which germination has been com- 
menced, and then arrested by heat. If bruised malt 
be mingled with the ground meal of other grain, and 
water, at the proper temperature, be added, as is done 
in what is technically called the mashing process, the 
diastase of the malt serves to convert the additional 
Starch into Sugar. The sweet liquid drawn off is 
called the wort. It contains the newly formed Sugar, 
which may then be changed to Alcohol by the com- 
mon method of fermentation. 



20 CHEMICAL ORIGIN, NATURE AND 

17. Principle of distillation. — As Alcohol is always 
generated in a liquid solution of sugar, it must of 
course at first be mingled and diluted with a large 
proportion of water ; its separation from this water, 
constitutes the process of distillation. The term dis- 
tillation is usually employed to designate all the suc- 
cessive operations of malting, mashing, fermentation, 
and the final separation of the spirituous product; 
but, strictly, it applies only to the last process. The 
circumstance made use of in distillation is the varia- 
tion in the boiling point of liquids. Alcohol boils, or 
is converted into vapor, at a temperature nearly forty 
degrees lower than that required for the boiling or 
vaporization of water. A heat therefore which is 
insufficient to convert water into steam, raises Alcohol 
to the vaporous state. The Alcoholic vapor is then 
transferred through suitable pipes into a vessel {worm 
of the still) which is surrounded with cold water ;— -it 
is here condensed into a liquid. The first product 
which passes over is, however, by no means pure. 
Alcohol has a very powerful chemical attraction for 
water, and retains a portion of it in combination as it 
passes through the vaporous condition. A second 
distillation reduces the proportion of water, and forms 
what is termed spirits of wine, A third distillation 
renders the Alcohol still stronger, forming rectified 
spirits of ivine, which still contains from ten to twenty 
per cent, of water. This can only be entirely sepa- 



PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 21 

rated by powerful chemical means, as the use of quick 
lime, or carbonate of potash, which, combining with 
the remaining water, leaves pure or absolute Alcohol. 
The common commercial Alcohols contain variable 
proportions of water, which are determined by instru- 
ments called alcoholmeters. 

18. Properties of Alcohol. — Pure Alcohol is a colorless 
transparent liquid, of an agreeable fruity odor, and a 
penetrating burning taste. It is about one fifth lighter 
than water, (sp. gr. 794,) and has such a strong attrac- 
cion for that substance (17) that when bottles contain- 
it are left open, it withdraws it from the atmosphere 
and becomes heavier. Hence the weight, or specific 
gravity of a mixture, is made use of to determine the 
proportion of spirit it contains. It is more volatile 
than water, that is, it evaporates and disappears faster 
when exposed to the air. It has never been frozen 
even by a temperature 180 degrees below the zero of 
our common scale, and is hence adapted for use in 
thermometers where the cold is so great as to freeze 
mercury. As is shown by the diagram, Alcohol 
consists of four atoms of Carbon, six of Hydrogen, and 
two of Oxygen. It is therefore highly inflammable, 
and burns with a lambent blue flame, producing no 
smoke, or soot, and only a small amount of light, but 
a very intense heat. This property adapts it admi- 
rably to the wants of chemists, who burn it in lamps 



22 CHEMICAL ORIGIN, NATURE AND 

as a common source of heat. In burning, its Carbon 
and Hydrogen combine with Oxygen, forming car- 
bonic acid and water. It is much used as a solvent, 
as it dissolves many substances which water will not. 
It has also powerful antiseptic properties ; that is, it 
prevents the change and putrefaction of vegetable and 
animal substances, when placed in it. , It is therefore 
employed in a culinary way to preserve various fruits, 
and also by Physicians and Naturalists, to keep dead 
bodies from decomposition. 

19. Alcohol the essential ingredient in all Spirituous 
Liquors. — It is to this ingredient that all spirituous 
liquors owe their characteristic and remarkable prop- 
erties. They are distinguished from each other by 
the proportion of the Alcoholic element, and by pecul- 
iarities of taste, odor and color, which • may either 
have been derived naturally from the fermented 
juices, or added artificially. Thus, the flavors of the 
numerous wines are due to the oily and etherial aro- 
matic substances which either existed in the grape, or 
were generated during fermentation. The taste of 
gin is imparted to it by the addition of juniper ber- 
ries, and that of beer by hops. It is, however, on 
account of the Alcoholic constituent which they all 
possess in common, that they are sought and prized ; 
to this they owe their peculiar characteristic influence 
upon the animal system. 



PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. ■ 23 

So well is this understood, that the term Alcohol 
has come into general use as the synonyme of all 
kinds of Spirituous and Intoxicating Liquors. Says 
Dr. Beck,* " On the effects of this poison, when 
taken, as it ordinarily' is, by persons in habits of 
intoxication, it is not necessary for me to enlarge. I 
haye only to refer to its effects in a pure state, and in 
large doses, and then, by comparing these results with 
the table published by Mr. Brande, of the quantity 
of Alcohol contained in various liquors, an idea may 
be formed of the injury, and indeed danger, to which 
life is so freely and generally exposed." 

20. Proportion of Alcohol in various Liquors. — The 
relative amount of Alcohol in different liquors varies 
greatly. According to Brande, Eum, Whiskey, 
Brandy and Gin contain from fifty-three to fifty -seven 
per cent. ; Port-Wine, twenty-two ; Champaigne, 
twelve ; Cider, five to nine ; and Beer four to six per 
cent. 

21. True source of Alcohol. — We thus understand the 
true derivation of this substance. All Alcohol, what- 
ever apparent form it assumes, has one origin. It 
comes from the destruction of sugar, and has no other 
source in nature. It is not a product of vegetable 
growth, like those substances which are created to 

* Medical Jurisprudence, vol. ii., p. 870. 



24 CHEMICAL ORIGIN, NATURE AND 

form the food of man. No chemist has ever yet 
found it among the compounds built up by plants. 
The solar beam, which "reaches like the Finger of 
God across the abysses of space," and-> in the labora- 
tory of vegetation, takes to pieces poisonous gases and 
puts together their atoms in new groups, which are 
capable of nourishing the animal body, — this celestial 
force never arranged together the atoms which form 
Alcohol. On the contrary, it is a product of dissolu- 
tion — of the wreck and disorganization of the princi- 
ples of human food. It has the same origin as those 
malignant and fatal exhalations which constitute the 
genius of pestilence — the death and putrefaction of 
organic matter. Indeed, the same act which gives 
birth to Alcohol, also brings into the world a twin 
compound, which is one of the promptest and subtlest 
of all poisons — Carbonic Acid Gas. 

22. Its relationship to organic compounds. — Alcohol is 
the first term in a series of decompositions, of de- 
scending changes which have for their object the re- 
storation of living matter to the mineral, unorganized 
state. This will be at once seen by reference to the 
preceding Chart. The attractions among the elements 
of the sugar-atom are overturned ; new and simpler 
attractions are established ; about one-half, by weight, 
of the sugar, assumes the form of Alcohol, and the 
other half reverts at once to the condition of Carbonic 



PROPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 25 

Acid — is thrown back into the world of dead unor- 
ganized matter in the form of a fatal poison to ani- 
mals, and fitted again to become food for growing veg- 
etation. The forces of growth and construction end 
with the production of the saccharine aliment. The 
Dynamics of dissolution are then brought into play, 
forming Carbonic Acid and Alcohol as their first 
effect. Under various circumstances the Alcohol may 
be decomposed, giving rise to numerous other com- 
pounds. If Sulphuric Acid, in certain proportions, is 
added to it, the Alcohol changes, as is seen in the dia- 
gram, the Sulphuric Acid attracts away from it the 
elements of one atom of water, and thus converts it 
into Ether. If an atom of water is taken from the 
Ether, (see the diagram,) or if two had been removed 
from Alcohol, Olefiant gas, the illuminating gas of 
cities, results. In the final stage we have the olefiant 
gas decomposed by atmospheric Oxygen, in burning, 
and resolved into water and Carbonic Acid. All the 
atoms of the organized compound have thus relapsed, 
by successive stages, to the mineral or quiescent state. 

23. Upon what the properties of Organized Compounds 
depend. — It will be seen, by referring to the diagram, 
that Alcohol and Ether consist of the same chemical 
elements as sugar ; but we must guard against the 
error of supposing that they are consequently similar 
in properties. All organized substances consist main- 
2 



26 



ly of the same three or four elements. Yet how in- 
finitely diverse are they in properties. These proper- 
ties depend less upon what they are composed of, 
than upon the proportions of their elements, or the 
way they are grouped. So delicately are organic sub- 
stances constituted, that we have but, as it were, to 
jar or jostle the arrangement of their atoms, in the 
slightest degree, and we destroy one and form an- 
other. Chemistry abounds in illustrations of this 
truth. The atmosphere, which is the vital sustainer 
of all animal life, consists of Oxygen and Nitrogen 
gases mixed in certain proportions. Now, if we com- 
bine these gases in different proportions, they would 
give rise, in one case, to exhilarating gas, which would 
madden all animals that should respire it; and, in 
other proportions, they would condense into a liquid 
ocean of Aquafortis. 

24. Alcohol has no existence in Grains or Food. We 
have not the shadow of a warrant for assuming that 
Alcohol exists, as such, in sugar, and, consequently, 
as is sometimes said, in grain. The production of 
Alcohol involves the destruction of one compound 
and the creation of another. Oxalic acid, ether, ole- 
fiant gas and a hundred other compounds, may be de- 
rived from the elements of sugar, but do these various 
substances therefore exist in the sugar ? Such an idea 
is but the nakedest assumption ; and besides, it would 



PKOPERTIES OF ALCOHOL. 27 

confound the distinction between all organic substan- 
ces, for they universally consist, as we have repeatedly 
seen, of precisely the same three or four elements. 
The properties of Organized Compounds depend 
upon the infinitely various proportions and groupings 
of their constituent atoms. 

Note. — For fuller information concerning the Chemistry of or- 
ganized bodies, the reader is referred to the Author's Class-Book of 
Chemistry, published by D. Appleton & Co., New York. 



28 INFLUENCE OF ALCOHOL UPON 



EFFECTS UPON THE HUMAN SYSTEM, 



II. INFLUENCE OF ALCOHOL UPON THE 
DIGESTIVE PEOCESS. 

25. Is alcohol digested? — When liquors containing 
Alcohol are drank, and enter the stomach, they do 
not remain there to be digested like solid food ; nor 
do they pass into the intestines to enter the circulation 
by the common route of alimentary substances. They 
are taken up, or absorbed, at once, in the same way as 
water, by the veins of the stomach, and are then car- 
ried forward into larger vessels, and thus mingle di- 
rectly with the mass of the blood. Dr. Percy made nu- 
merous experiments upon the lower animals, by inject- 
ing strong Alcohol into the stomach, and thus poison- 
ing them to death. Upon a subsequent examination, 
if not too long delayed, he was always able to detect 
Alcohol in the blood of the poisoned animal. The 
speed with which this result is brought about, can be 
explained in no other way than by the direct and 
rapid absorption of the Alcohol. In one of Dr. Per- 
cy's experiments, in which the animal fell lifeless to 
the ground the moment the injection of Aclohol 



THE DIGESTIVE PROCESS. 29 

into the stomach was completed, the pulsations of 
the heart entirely ceased within two minutes, and 
the stomach was found nearly void, while the blood 
was strongly impregnated with Alcohol. More re- 
cently, also, Alcohol has been actually detected in the 
veins of the stomach, (gastric veins,) by two eminent 
French Physiologists, M. M. Bouchardat and Sandras 
(Carpenter)* 

26. Can Alcohol aid the stomach in the act of digestion f 
There is a prevalent belief that Alcohol is capable of 
so acting upon the stomach as to assist digestion. 
But a very slight acquaintance with the conditions 
under which this function is carried forward, will 
satisfy us that such action is impossible. Stomach 
digestion is. carried on by a fluid, called the gastric 
juice, which is secreted from the inner membrane or 
wall of the organ. The solvent or digestive power 
of this fluid over food is due to two different kinds of 
substances which it contains. The one is an acid. — it 
may be Chlorohydric, Acetic, or Lactic — and imparts 
an acidulous character to the digestive operations of 
the stomach. The other substance essential to di- 
gestion, is a peculiar organic 'principle called Pepsin. 
This is a nitrogenized compound which exists dis- 
solved in the gastric juice, and is supposed by Liebig, 
to be of the nature of a ferment. It is known that 
this substance is indispensable to digestion, but itsna- 
* See Dr. Percy's experimental researches, p. 61. 



30 INFLUENCE OF ALCOHOL. 

ture and properties are not so well understood. 
Chemists prepare it, by adding Alcohol to the gastric 
fluid, which precipiates the Pepsin. Alcohol throws 
down Pepsin from its soluble active form, to the solid 
inert condition. Taken into the stomach then, Alco- 
hol, so long as it remains there, must be a prompt and 
powerful antagonist of the digestive process. These 
statements are explicitly corroborated by the latest and 
highest physiological authority. Say Todd and Bow- 
man, " The use of Alcoholic stimulants also, retards di- 
gestion, by coagulating the Pepsin, and thereby interfer- 
ing with its action. Were it not that wine and spirits 
are rapidly absorbed, the introduction of these into 
the stomach in any quantity would be a complete bar 
to the digestion of the food, as the Pepsin would be 
precipitated from solution as quickly as it was secreted 
by the stomach."* 

27. Having entered the torrent of the circula- 
tion, the Alcohol is quickly brought into the presence 
of every part of the system. It speeds through heart, 
lungs, liver, and brain, penetrates every organ, trav- 
erses all tissues, and leaves no part unvisited. What, 
then, are the effects produced by this universal contact ? 
Let us first inquire concerning the relation of 
alcohol to each of the great leading constituents of the 
animal tissues as shown by experiment. 

* Todd and Bowman's Physiology of Man. Part 4, p. 210. 1852. 



CONSTITUENTS OF THE TISSUES — WATER. 31 



III. KELATION OF ALCOHOL TO THE CON- 
STITUENTS OF THE TISSUES.— WATEK. 

28. Design of the Animal System. — The complete 
animal structure has been contrived and adapted for 
the accomplishment of a single purpose. The mus- 
cular and nervous systems are most immediately en- 
gaged in bringing about the result, but all parts con- 
tribute more or less directly to this grand end — the 
reception and transmission, the development and mani- 
festation of power. 

29. Fundamental condition of the exercise of Force. — 
Now, it is an established law in the economy of living 
beings, that the production of force is always attended 
by waste of matter. Every act involves a partial 
destruction of the vital instrument engaged in its per- 
formance. Living machines, as well as inanimate ones, 
wear by use. With the birth of power, there is death 
of living matter. Every contraction of a muscle, 
every transit of the nervous influence is accompanied 
by the passage of the living atoms of muscle and nerv,e 
into the condition of death. Every action of mind 
upon the nervous system disintegrates or breaks down 
a portion of nervous matter, just as every train sent 
over a railroad wears away some portion of the iron 



32 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO THE 

track. In the action of the surrounding universe 
upon the living conscious being by which impressions 
are poured in upon the mind through the channels of 
sense, and in the reaction of the potential soul upon 
that universe, there are incessant changes in the posi- 
tion and relationship of 'chemical atoms— changes of 
atoms from the organized to the mineral state— from 
life to death. 

30. The products of waste must be removed from the 
system. — The atoms that thus perish in the body can- 
not be used over again. They become at once nox- 
ious to the system, and if suffered to accumulate, they 
clog and poison it, inducing disease and death. The 
atoms of carbonic acid formed throughout the human 
body, by natural decay and decomposition, if retained 
within it for five minutes, would cause death. The 
liquid and gaseous products of waste and wear must 
hence be promptly and continuously removed. 

31. What is nutrition? But other than destructive 
changes go on within the body ; if left entirely to these, 
the vital energies would be speedily broken down, 
and the fabric itself consumed. The maintenance of 
health and vigor requires the constant renewal of the 
failing muscular and nervous tissues. To effect this 
purpose, we use food, which is a kind of matter so pre- 
pared by the hand of Nature that it is capable of 



CONSTITUENTS OF THE TISSUES — WATER. 33 

taking the place of the dying atoms (10). This con- 
stant supply of new substance, which replaces the 
particles that have perished, is termed nutrition. 

32. The living animal a theatre of rapid internal 
changes. — We gather from these facts that the animal 
fabric is a theatre of unceasing changes. The unal- 
terable condition of its permanence is decay and reno- 
vation, by which material atoms are thrown into 
movement and transported from place to place. 
Through innumerable channels the nutrient matter is 
distributed to all parts and the products of decompo- 
sition are gathered up and cast away. Several pounds 
of waste matter are expelled from the system each 
day, and an equal amount of nourishing material sent 
to take its place. Of air, water, and food, it is esti- 
mated that an adult man consumes upward of three 
thousand pounds weight in a year. 

33. Water the great vehicle of vital changes. — We 
thus see that great freedom of motion, among its 
chemical constituents, is indispensable to the living sys- 
tem. It is impossible that the body should be com- 
posed wholly or chiefly of solids, and hence we find 
that much the larger part of it exists in the liquid 
form. The medium that Creative Wisdom has pre- 
pared to conduct the vital changes of living beings is 
WATER 



34 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO THE 

34. Importance of Water in the animal economy. — 
The presence of this liquid is essential to all life ; it 
is a leading constituent of every organized substance. 
From the lowest condition in which vitality is mani- 
fested to the highest, from the humblest moss cling- 
ing to the surface of a naked rock, upward through 
all the gradations of vegetable and animal life to man 
at the summit of the scale, every living being re- 
quires a copious and constant supply of water to 
maintain the vital functions. Four-fifths of the blood 
and three-fourths of the brain, muscles, nerves, and tis- 
sues of all organs that make up the apparently solid 
flesh, consist of water. It is the vehicle of all change, 
the great transporter of the organized world. It 
courses through the animal system along countless 
channels, and with almost immeasurable velocity ; it 
is the chief agent of digestion, absorption, nutrition, 
secretion, and all the wonderful transmutations which 
take place perpetually in the vital structure. 

35. Magnitude of the demand and supply of Water. 

Our first physical necessity is for air to breathe ; the 
second, is for water to drink. So large and continual 
is the demand for it that a healthy man consumes 
three-quarters of a ton annually ; three hundred times 
his own weight when he has arrived at the period of 
manhood. So immense a consumption requires a cor- 
responding supply ; and accordingly, we find that the 



CONSTITUENTS OF THE TISSUES — WATER. 35 

provision of this liquid in the economy of nature, is 
on a scale proportional to its importance. It is the 
most abundant of all known material substances. Its 
reservoirs are miles in depth, and cover three-fourths 
of the globe. Through the action of physical forces 
it is raised in vapor, and borne away by atmospheric 
currents, falls condensed upon the land — a process of 
regular natural distillation. The direction and extent 
of these atmospheric currents, laden with water, de- 
termine the distribution of living beings upon the 
earth. Where there is abundance of water, there life 
is exuberant; but where it is withheld, we find the 
desert. 

36. Adaptation of Water to the needs of the system. — 
When we reflect upon the properties of this sub- 
stance, the plenitude of its supply, thevastness of the 
plan of operations by which it is purified and fur- 
nished to the inhabitants of the land ; when we ob- 
serve in what a wonderful degree it is adapted to the 
grand offices it is designed to perform in the scheme 
of the living world ; its perfect liquidity within a con- 
siderable range of temperature ; its neutral and passive 
attributes ; its wide range of solvent powers by which 
it changes its nature and acquires the qualities of a 
thousand different substances ; when we consider how 
admirably it is fitted to carry forward that uninter- 
rupted series of mutations, those subtle and exquisite 
changes which characterize the animal organism, we 



36 KELATJON OF ALCOHOL TO THE 

are hardly a.ble to resist the thought, that, in the order 
of Providence, Water was created first, and that the 
whole plan and policy of organized nature was adapted 
and conformed to its properties. 

37. Alcohol has a powerful attraction for animal tis- 
sues. — The constituent water of flesh is held in com- 
bination with it by a certain amount of chemical or 
capillary attraction. Any agent or force which dis- 
turbs the natural equilibrium of this attraction, tends 
to produce disorganization. When Alcohol is brought 
into contact with animal membrane or flesh, it is 
at once absorbed, penetrating and diffusing itself 
throughout all parts of the tissue. It seizes upon 
membranes with a powerful affinity. Dr. Percy* found 
that, in case of animals poisoned by swallowing strong 
Alcohol, the coats of the stomach retained it after 
long washing and soaking; nor did a jet of water di- 
rected upon it for some time avail to remove it. 

38. delation of Alcohol to the Water of tissues — Lie- 
bifs experiment— -Jtfow, the Alcohol in this case acts 
as a disorganizing agent, It acts destructively upon 
the part which it enters, by altering its normal consti- 
tution. This has been demonstrated by Liebig. That 
consummate Experimenter took one hundred and 
forty-one grains of fresh animal membrane, which con- 

* Experimental Inquiry concerning the presence of Alcoho} in the 
ventricles of the brain, p. 29. 



CONSTITUENTS OF THE TISSUES — ALBUMEN. 37 

tained thirty-four grains of dry substance and one 
hundred and seven grains of water, and soaked it for 
a time in about two and a half cubic inches of Alco- 
hol. When removed, the membrane was found to 
contain thirty-two grains of Alcohol, and to have lost 
ninety-nine grains of water. "For one volume of 
Alcohol, therefore, retained by the membrane," says 
Leibig, " rather more than three volumes of water 
have been expelled from it." "Since, in this case," 
he continues, " so much more water has been expelled 
than of Alcohol absorbed, the first result must be a 
shrinking of the animal substance.* This form of its 
disorganizing action, " depletion of the tissues," as it 
is termed, is also recognized in accounting for the 
physiological and medicinal effects of Alcohol, by our 
standard authority in Materia Medica.f 

IV. KELATION OF ALCOHOL TO THE CON- 
STITUENTS OF THE TISSUES.— ALBUMEN. 

39. Albuminous principles of Food. — The food which 
we daily consume is composed of several alimentary 
principles, variously compounded; one of these is 
known as the Albuminous. It comprises the muscular 
or lean parts of meat, (Fibrin), the curd of cheese, (Case- 

* Liebig-'s Researches on the Chemistry of food and the motion of 
the juices in the animal body. P. 137. 
t Pereira's Materia Medica, Vol. I., p.p. 142, 144 j 3d Am. Ed. 1852. 



38 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO THE 

in), the sticky, adhesive portion of the flour of grain, 
( Gluten), and the white of eggs, (Albumen). Their chem- 
ical composition has been noticed (7) ; see also the dia. 
grams. They are the same whether derived from the 
vegetable or animal kingdom. 

40. The Nutritive principles are converted into Albumen 
in the body. — Organic chemistry has recently proved, to 
the satisfaction of Physiologists, that the structure of 
the animal body, all its fibrous and vascular parts, its 
muscular, nervous and cellular tissue, are directly and 
entirely derived from the Albuminous portions of food. 
By digestion, they are all dissolved and thrown into 
the form of Albumen, which is a liquid. This liquid 
then passes along the appointed route, enters the gen- 
eral circulation, and of course, is carried to all parts of 
the system. Albumen is found in all organs, in the 
brain and nerves, the liver, kidneys, spleen, pancreas, 
and all glands, in the peculiar juices which pervade 
the flesh, and is a large and constant ingredient of the 
blood of all animals. 

41. Albumen is transformed into Fibrin. — Under the 
influence of the heat generated within the body, and 
of respired Oxygen gas, the vital element of the air, 
the Albumen of the body undergoes achange — a change 
of form only; it is transformed into Fibrin. Fibrin 
is that principle of the blood which clots when with- 



CONSTITUENTS OF THE TISSUES — ALBUMEN. 39 

drawn from the body. It is a thready, stringy, fibrous 
substance ; it is Albumen so altered as to possess these 
properties. It exists at first in the blood in a soluble 
or liquid condition, but when taken away it quickly 
coagulates, clots, or is precipitated, and separates as 
solid Fibrin. The same thing constantly occurs within 
the body ; the Fibrin coagulates, separates, and is 
deposited as flesh. These changes have been aptly 
compared to the spinning and weaving of cotton. The 
albumen resembles raw cotton ; it is spun in the system 
into thready Fibrin, and that is woven into the various 
tissues of flesh, Oxygen gas being the motive power 
of the factory. The transformation, distribution and 
deposition of these substances is called nutrition. 

42. Value of Albumen in Animal Organisms. — We 
thus see how important is the part which Albumen 
plays in the vital economy. Every where throughout 
organized nature, we find the phenomena of life depend- 
ent upon its presence. It is the starting point of all 
giowth, the foundation material from which all tissues 
are renewed, and the whole animal structure elaborated. 
This becomes most obvious when we contemplate what 
occurs in a fowl's egg.. The contents of the egg are 
mainly Albumen and Water. By the heat of incuba- 
tion, and the presence of Oxygen, which enters through 
the porous shell, (the same conditions, therefore, which 
we have in the animal body by respiration,) all parts 



40 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO THE 

of the young chicken, flesh, blood, membranes, nerves, 
tendons, blood vessels, cells, feathers, and claws, are 
produced ; and bones, also, with the aid of lime from 
the shell. The elements of all these organs which now 
possess form and vitality, before incubation, were 
simply elements of Albumen. It is therefore in this 
case, as well as in that of higher animals, the plastic 
source of all the bodily structures. 



43. Alcohol incapable of nourishing the body. — From 
these considerations, it will be seen at once that Alco- 
hol is unable to aid in the nutrition of the body. It 
cannot be transformed into tissue; none but Albu- 
minous aliments can be thus changed. Its chemical 
composition, as we see by the diagram, forbids it, for 
Alcohol contains no Nitrogen, while all animal tissues 
abound in it. The body can no more make or repair 
muscle or fibre with Alcohol, than a mechanic can 
make gold out of iron. It involves the transmuta- 
tion of chemical elements, which is an impossibility. 
As Alcohol cannot nourish the wearing and wasting 
tissues, it therefore has no power to renew the declin- 
ing strength, or restore the over-fatigued and prostrate 
system. When taken for this purpose, it accomplishes 
a far different thing (66-68) ; and he who depends upon 
it cheats himself. For the formal demonstration of 
the principles of Alimentation here assumed, and now 



CONSTITUENTS OF THE TISSUES — ALBUMEN. 41 

universally accepted, the enquiring reader is referred 
to the writings of Mulder and Liebig. 

44. Effect of heat upon Albumen. — The action of heat 
impresses a peculiar change upon Albumen, as is seen 
in boiling an egg. From a transparent, glairy liquid, 
heat alters it to an opaque, white, brittle solid. 165° 
of heat is sufficient to do this ; so that if from any cause 
the temperature of the globe should be elevated to 
this point, the Albumen of all living organisms would 
become solidified, the blood and vital fluids curdled, 
and all life would cease. 

45. Influence of Alcohol upon Albumen. — The effect 
of Alcohol upon Albumen, is the same as excess of 
heat ; it coagulates it, throws it from the liquid to the 
solid state, as may be at any time seen by mingling it 
with white of egg. This is one of the modes of ac- 
tion by which Alcohol destroys life, when taken in 
excessive quantity, or in a concentrated form. I 
quote the highest and most recent chemical authority 
to this point.* " Concentrated Alcohol acts as a pois- 
on on the animal economy, and will produce death, 
when taken in large quantities. Injected into the 
veins, it produces almost sudden death, by coagulating 
the Albumen of the blood.' 1 

* Regnault's Chemistry, Vol. ii., p. 515, 1852. 



42 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO THE 

46. Now, in the ordinary rise of alcoholic drinks, 
there is not enough taken to produce this result on a 
sufficiently extensive scale to cause death. But the re- 
sult is produced, and to an extent exactly correspond- 
ing to the quantity of alcohol drunk. The nature of 
the effect is in both cases the same, the difference is 
only in degree. It enters the blood and circulates 
through the system as alcohol, retaining all its proper- 
ties and powers, until destroyed or expelled. In 
whatever form taken, however diluted, and with 
whatever mixed, a particle of alcohol coming in 
contact with a particle of albumen, the latter is hard- 
ened and solidified, and thus its vital transformation 
into fibrin — an essential step in the nutrive process — 
is prevented. 

47. Alcohol obstructs the Nutritive and Reparative Func- 
tions. — It has been observed by experimenters, that 
where animals are poisoned by Alcohol, the blood, 
after death, either remains in a fluid state, or is 
very imperfectly coagulated. The fibrin continues in 
a fluid condition, precisely as when an animal has 
been killed by lightning, or suffocated with carbonic 
acid gas. This two-fold action of Alcohol upon the 
leading constituents of the blood, first retarding the 
transformation of albumen into fibrin, and then ob- 
structing the coagulation of the fibrin, must inevita- 
bly depress the plastic powers of the blood, and greatly 
disturb the nutritive operations. This result is in full 
accordance with observed facts, and the highest medical 



CONSTITUENTS OF THE TISSUES — ALBUMEN. 43 

testimony. Of the British army in India, some regi- 
ments practiced total abstinence, and others made use 
of the spirit ration . The commanding officers report 
ed, that so far as regards recovery from sabre-gashes, 
sword-cuts, and gunshot wounds, the restoration was 
more prompt, and fewer cases terminated fatally, in 
the total-abstinence regiments, than in the others. 
So, also, in surgical practice, it is well known, that 
experienced operators are much more hesitant about 
undertaking formidable cases, when the patient has 
been addicted to the free use of Alcoholic drinks, than 
in other instances, the nutritive and reparative pow- 
ers being too low.* 

48. Practical recognition of these principles. — In the 
case of individuals trained for prize-fights, by the best 
managers, precisely the opposite condition is remark- 
ed. The body recovers with wonderful facility from 

* Says Dr. J. N. Carnochan, a distinguished practical surgeon, and 
Professor in one of the New York Medical Colleges, in a letter which 
appeared in the Tribune of Oct. 26, 1853 : " As a surgeon, however, 
having vast opportunities of experience, in hospital and private prac- 
tice, I must declare that I always look upon patients who have been 
in the habit of using spirituous beverages, as least likely to recover 
from serious maladies, or from the shock following capital operations ; 
and,. also, as those most likely to require longer time for the cure of 
diseases of a more simple character. I have, at times, met with cases 
of fracture of the bones, occurring in persons of intemperate habits, 
in whom the bones would not unite by bony material, but remained 
flexible and useless, on account of the union being ligamentous." 



44 EFFECT OF ALCOHOL UPON THE 

the effects of injuries,— wounds heal rapidly. The 
best systems of training involve three essential points : 
first, the requisite amount of exercise ; second, a pro- 
per diet, chiefly lean meat and stale bread ; and third, 

ABSTINENCE FROM THE USE OF FERMENTED OR ALCO- 
HOLIC LIQUORS ! * 

V. EFFECT OF ALCOHOL UPON THE INSPI- 
RATION AND CIRCULATION. 

49. Action of respired gas upon the system. — The 
gases that we breathe take entire control of the sys- 
tem, physical and intellectual. Their command over 
the life-forces is absolute. Thus, if we breathe an at- 
mosphere of pure carbonic acid, the vital machinery 
stops instantaneously, and forever. If we inhale the 
same gas, much diluted with air, the powers of the 
system are clogged and depressed. Breathe the va- 
por of sulphuric ether, or chloroform, and the instru- 
ments of sensation are temporarily locked in the par- 
alysis of death, and " we enter a world where there is 
no more pain." Inhale nitrous oxide, and the wheels 
of life spin with preternatural velocity, the muscular 
powers are augmented, intellection is intensified, the 
brain whirls in a vortex of excitement, and, as has 
been beautifully said, a man lives a year in a min- 
ute, and that minute is in the seventh heaven. But 

* See*Carpenter's Human Physiology, p. 483. 



RESPIRATION AND CIRCULATION. 45 

if we respire common air in its Datura! proportions, 
we nave a rate of action in the system, a series of 
regulated changes and transformations which we term 
health of body and sanity of mind. The cause of 
these remarkable effects is, that the respiratory mech- 
anism opens directly to the blood, and the gaseous 
agent which enters it, gains immediate access to all 
parts of the system, diffuses through every organ, and 
penetrates and saturates the entire body. 

50. Importance of the respiratory process. — The first 
physical necessity of animated beings is, for air to res- 
pire, and the active principle of air is Oxygen gas 
(2.) The introduction of this substance into the bodi- 
ly system is the fundamental event of animal life ; all 
other physiological operations are subordinate to this, 
and depend upon it. We eat, digest, and assimilate 
food only that it may finally minister to the respira- 
tory process — may be disorganized and destroyed by 
Oxygen. It impels the normal changes of the sys- 
tem, (28-32,) in which health consists. It sustains the 
whole by destroying the parts, and is thus the great 
motor of animal vitality. 

51. Action of Oxygen within the system. — If we in any 
manner touch the relation of Oxygen gas to the living 
system, the vital machinery is at once deranged. If 
by Providential interference, the chemical powers of 



46 EFFECT OF ALCOHOL UPON THE 

this wonderful substance should be either augmented 
or depressed, or if its relative proportion in the atmos- 
phere should be materially increased or diminished, 
the universal destruction of living races would be the 
inevitable consequence. We witness the baneful ef- 
fects of reducing its natural quantity, in the air of 
confined and unventilated apartments, which is charged 
with physiological mischief of the most serious nature. 
There is an adjustment of exquisite harmony between 
the chemical energy or affinity of Oxygen, and the 
chemical composition of those compounds which form 
the animal body. In breathing Nitrous Oxide, 
(laughing gas,) which is extremely soluble in the 
blood, we overcharge the system with Oxygen, and 
there is, at once, preternatural excitement. The 
muscular system is quickened to unwonted activi- 
ty, the brain is over-stimulated, reason prostrated, 
and the mind goes delirious. These are all simply 
the result of heightened combustion throughout the 
body. It is precisely like driving a powerful blast of 
wind upon a conflagration, arousing it to augmented 
fury. 

52. Effect of increasing the combustibility of the constitu- 
ents of the body. — But the same result may be effected 
in another way. If, instead of supplying to the sys- 
tem an extra charge of Oxygen, we, on the other 
hand, alter the constituents of the body, and endow 



EFFECT OF ALCOHOL UPON THE 47 

them with a higher attraction for this gas, we shall 
have the same augmented combustion, abnormal ex- 
citement, and over-stimulation. Instead of an extra 
supply of Oxygen, what there is, is seized upon with 
greater avidity, and the same disturbance of equilibri- 
um and intensification of both intellectual and physi- 
cal action is the consequence. These effects are pro- 
duced by the presence of Alcohol in the system. 

53. Relations of Alcohol and Oxygen. — The relations of 
Alcohol to Oxygen, the vital sustainer of animal life,are 
totally different from those compounds which constitute 
our natural food. Its attractions for this gas are more 
powerful than those of any alimentary substance. 
Predominance of Nitrogen in food imparts to it low 
combustibility; that is, weakens its attractions for 
Oxygen. Predominance of Carbon greatly increases 
its combustive attractions, and predominance of Hy- 
drogen augments this property in a pre-eminent de- 
gree. It will now be seen, by reference to the chart 
of diagrams, that the Protein compounds stand lowest 
in this relation, and the Fats and Oils highest; and 
these, it is well known, are the most inflamatory and 
stimulating of all dietary compounds. Now, by 
glancing at the composition of Alcohol, it will be ob- 
served, that it takes a much higher rank as a com- 
bustible than even the Oils and Fats. Like them, it 
contains no Nitrogen, abounds in Carbon, and con- 



48 RESPIRATION AND CIRCULATION. 

tains a great excess of Hydrogen. There are as many 
atoms of Hydrogen, as of both its other elements put 
together. In the Fats and Oils, the proportion of 
Hydrogen does not even equal that of Carbon ; but 
Alcohol contains of Hydrogen half as many again 
atoms as of Carbon. Now, the reader need hardly be 
reminded that Hydrogen (2) is the leading fiery in- 
gredient of organic compounds. It attracts Oxygen 
with intense energy, and we generate the highest ar- 
tificial heat by burning these gases together by means 
of the oxy-hydrogen blowpipe. 



54. Conditions of Phsyiological Harmony. — The 
Creator of these "fearful and wonderful" organisms 
has graduated, with omniscient exactness, the recipro- 
cal powers and affinities of the gases we inhale and 
the food we digest. Their rate of reaction constitutes 
the equilibrium of health, and no substance, widely 
different from those appointed by God for the pur- 
pose, can be substituted without prompt and serious 
disorder. Science would predict that a compound of this 
nature introduced into the living body, especially if 
it were of a diffusable nature like Alcohol, would not 
behave as a true dietary principle, but as a disturber 
of the physiological harmonies, a quickener and pro- 
vocative of all the functions, a swift aud fiery stimu- 
lant. And this accords with universal experience. 



EFFECT OF ALCOHOL UPON THE 49 

55. Effects of Alcohol upon the General System. — 
When Alcoholic liquors are taken in sufficient quan- 
tity to produce their peculiar results, the first effect 
we notice is an increase in the speed with which the 
blood flows through the system. This is shown by 
the increased force and rapidity with which the heart 
beats, and by the fuller, stronger and more frequent 
pulse. With this, there seems to be a general exalta- 
tion of the functions of the body. The appetite is 
sharpened and the secretions augmented, especially 
those of the skin and kidnej^s. The brain is also 
affected ; for there is all the evidence of mental and 
emotive disturbance, such, as unusual talkativeness, 
rapidity and variety of thought, exhilaration of the 
spirits, animation of the features and gestures, flushed 
countenance, and suffusion of the eyes. In short, all 
the vital functions are moving at an accelerated rate. 
If more liquor be taken, the excitement is heightened, 
rising into complete perversion of all the powers, in- 
tellectual and corporeal. The mind becomes con- 
fused and oblivious, the eyes are vacant or glazed, 
the voice is thick, and the muscular movements tremu- 
lous and unsteady. In the profounder stages of in- 
toxication, the action of the mind is completely broken 
down, and the individual falls into a heavy torpid 
slumber, from which it may be difficult or impossible 
to arouse him. This train of phenomena, variously 
modified in different instances, constitutes the out- 



50 RESPIRATION AND CIRCULATION. 

ward and visible marks of progressive drunkenness, 
and it is accompanied by certain demonstrated inter- 
nal effects, involving the respiratory and circulatory 
processes. 

56. Chemical changes of the circulation. — Circulation 
and respiration are reciprocal and mutually depend- 
ant functions. The current of blood pours rapidly 
through the lungs to meet there, and become loaded 
or charged with. Oxygen gas. It then flows away with 
its vital burden to all parts of the system, distributing 
and parting with its Oxygen to afford the natural 
stimulus of health and activity. It now moves 
through a system of blood vessels called arteries, is of 
a bright red color, and known as Arterial or Oxygen- 
ated blood. The Oxygen is lost by combining with 
Carbon, Hydrogen, Sulphur and Phosphorus, which 
it meets everywhere. The products thus formed are 
taken up by the blood to be removed from the system. 
The compounds of Sulphur, Phosphorus and Nitrogen, 
are strained off by the kidneys, and rejected through 
that channel. The compounds of Hydrogen and 
Carbon, Water and Carbonic Acid, (see diagram), are 
expelled, partially through the pores of the skin, but 
chiefly through the lungs. The blood that returns to 
the lungs passes along the system of blood-vessels 
called veins ; it is of a dark purple color, and is termed 
venous or carbonated blood. The change, or manu- 



EFFECT OF ALCOHOL UPON THE 51 

facture, as it were, of Venous out of Arterial, or Car- 
bonated out of Oxygenated blood, takes place in all 
the extremely minute (capillary) blood-vessels of the 
body, and is the grand healthful transformation of the 
living economy. 

57. Alcohol prevents the natural changes which go on in 
the blood. — When Arterial blood is withdrawn from 
the body, and Alcohol mingled with it, the florid color 
disappears, it becomes darkened, and at once changed 
to Carbonated or Venous blood. Bouchardat of 
France, a very skilful Physiological Experimenter, 
found that when Alcohol is introduced into the system 
in excess, that the blood in the Arteries presents the 
Venous aspect. Liebig observes, that " by the use of 
Alcohol a limit must rapidly be put to the change of 
matter in certain parts of the body. The Oxygen of 
the Arterial blood which, in the absence of the Alcohol, 
would have combined with the matter of the tissues, 
or with that formed by the metamorphosis of the tis- 
sues, now combines with the elements of Alcohol. 
The Arterial blood becomes Venous without the substance 
of the muscles having taken any share in the transforma- 
tion. 71 That is, the presence of Alcohol in the blood 
puts a stop to the natural changes which characterize 
health, frustrates them by consuming the Oxygen 
which they require, and thus defeats the prime pur- 
pose of respiration, and of course disorders, to a greater 



52 RESPIRATION AND CIRCULATION. 

or less degree, all the functions of the system which 
depend upon it. 

58. Antiseptic action of Alcohol in the System. — 
Although Alcohol is more combustible than any of 
the natural constituents of the body, and will, conse- 
quently, itself change first, yet it possesses a remark- 
able power of hindering or obstructing changes in 
other substances with which it may be in contact. 
Thus fruits, as every one knows, are protected from 
decay and change by being immersed in spirits, which 
are mixtures of Alcohol and water. The Alcohol 
prevents decomposition or alteration. So also the 
bodies, limbs, and organs of animals are prevented 
from putrefying or changing, if surrounded by a mix- 
ture of Alcohol. This power is called antiseptic, or 
decay- opposing. Wow, as the changes which constantly 
go on in the living healthy system are of precisely the 
same nature as the putrefactions and decompositions 
which supervene after death, and differ only in being 
regulated, and in the steady removal of their products 
from the system, the inference is inevitable that 
Alcohol in the living system, so long as its presence 
continues there, produces this effect — acts antisepti- 
cally to check the proper transformations of the body. 

59. It impedes the liberation of Carbonic Acid. — Fur- 
thermore, Alcohol has an injurious action upon the 
system, by preventing or retarding the escape of the 



ETC. 53 

products of waste. Dr. Prout, an English Experi- 
menter of .the highest physiological authority, states 
that Alcohol, and all the liquors containing it, which 
he had tried, have the remarkable power of diminish- 
ing the quantity of Carbonic Acid Gas in the expired 
air, or that thrown out of the lungs, much more than 
any thing else which he had made the subject of ex- 
periment. He found the effect most decided when 
the liquor was taken upon an empty stomach, the very 
time it is usually resorted to, to quicken the appetite. 
Vierordt, another scientific authority of the highest 
rank, fully confirms Dr. Prout's observations, having 
found that, in four experiments, the per centage of 
Carbonic Acid fell, after from half to a whole bottle of 
wine had been taken, and the effects lasted from one 
to two hours. It is well known, that after a full meal, 
the quantity of Carbonic Acid expired is greater than 
usual ; but Yierordt found that when he drank wine 
with his dinner, the usual per centage of expired Car- 
bonic Acid did not take place. Dr. Prout also observed, 
that no sooner had the effects of the Alcohol passed 
off than the amount of Carbonic Acid rose much above 
the normal standard, thus proving its previous unnatu- 
ral retention in the system. 



54 ALCOHOL AS A HEAT-PRODUCING AGENT. 



YL— ALCOHOL AS A HEAT-PRODUCING- 
AGENT. 

60. As certain parts of food, namely, the non-nitro- 
genized alimentary principles, seem to be devoted in 
the body to the production of heat, (calorification), a 
claim has been set up on this score for Alcohol to take 
rank as an alimentary principle. High authorities 
have lent a dubious sanction to this view, but evidently 
out of deference more to custom than science. 

61. Alcohol not a true Respiratory Aliment. — If the 
facts upon which this doctrine has been too hastily 
built be conceded to the utmost, they yet furnish no 
just foundation for it. We may admit that Alcohol is 
burned in the Human System, and that this combus- 
tion produces heat, but that is not the point. The 
question is, has Alcohol been endowed with such 
properties, that it may be burned in the organism 
without injury, in the same manner as those heat pro- 
ducing compounds which are formed by nature in 
plants, and which exist in all healthy food ? We are 
not to stop with the simple inquiry, will Alcohol pro- 
duce heat ? we must ask. is it a proper, healthful, natu- 
ral source of heat. M. Milne-Edwards injected Phos- 
phorus, dissolved in oil, into the veins of an animal, and 
it was soon seen to escape in the expired breath as a 



ALCOHOL AS A HEAT-PRODUCING AGENT. 55 

white vapor — Phosphoric Acid — burnt Phosphorus. 
This terrific poison is thus capable of producing ani- 
mal heat ; but is it, therefore, a proper heat-evolving 
substance ? To take rank as a respiratory aliment, it 
must be shown that Alcohol, like the other bland and 
normal compounds of nature, can minister to this pro- 
cess without otherwise injuring the system. But the 
whole current of evidence presented in this work 
shows the contrary to be the fact. 

62. Alcohol does not protect the system against cold. — 
So far from being superior, or in any manner equal to 
the non-nitrogenized principles of diet as an efficient 
protection against cold, Alcohol falls very far below 
them; indeed, it cannot perform their work, and hence 
has no shadow of claim to be ranked among them. 
The combustive aliments, when taken into the sys- 
tem, occasion no disturbance, but are consumed gradu 
ally and give out their heat steadily, thus producing 
an equal and sustained result, which lasts through sev- 
eral hours, or until more food be required. Alcohol, 
on the contrary, when taken, creates an immediate ex- 
citement. It kindles a temporary glow in the system 
by over-stimulating it, and by robbing the coming 
hours of the vital energy which is their due. It thus, 
instead of really fortifying the body against extreme 
cold, actually weakens and breaks down its natural 
power of resistance. Those who employ it, therefore, 



5$ ALCOHOL AS A HEAT-PRODUCING AGENT. 

cannot expect to be able to withstand severe cold as 
effectually as those who do not. A volume of testi- 
mony, if we had space, might be cited to establish this 
principle. 

63. Testimony and Facts. — The Parrys and the 
the Eosses, the Scoresbys and the Kichardsons, Naval 
Commanders, who have wintered crews in high polar 
latitudes, and therefore in the extremest perils of cold, 
bear a uniform and emphatic testimony against the 
use of Alcohol as a heat-producing beverage in these 
circumstances. " In 1619, the crew of a Danish ship 
of 60 men, well supplied with provision and ardent 
spirit, attempted to pass the winter at Hudson's Bay, 
but fifty -eight of them died before spring ; while, in the 
case of an English crew of twenty-two men, in the 
same circumstances, but destitute of distilled spirit, 
only two died. In another instance, of eight English- 
men, also without spirituous liquors, who wintered in 
the same Bay, the whole survived, and returned to 
England ; and four Eussians, left without ardent 
spirits or provisions in Spitzbergen, lived for a period 
of six years, and were at length restored to their 
country. In the winter of 1796, a vessel was wrecked 
on an island off the coast of Massachusetts; there 
were seven persons on board ; it was night ; five of 
them resolved to quit the wreck and seek shelter on 
shore. To prepare for the attempt, four of them drank 



ALCOHOL AS A STIMULANT. 57 

freely of spirits, the fifth would drink none. They 
all leaped into the water ; one was drowned before he 
reached the shore ; the other four came to land, and, 
in a deep snow and piercing cold, directed their steps 
to a distant light. All that drank spirit failed and 
stopped, and froze one after another. The man that 
drank none reached the house, and about two years 
ago was still alive."* 

VII. ALCOHOL AS A STIMULANT. 

64. It causes Irritation and Inflammation. — Besides 
these clearly determined chemical effects, Alcohol also 
exerts a potent action upon what are called the vital 
few passages upon this point from the excellent work 
of Dr. Carpenter, f "When Alcoholic liquids are ap- 
plied to living tissues, especially to the vascular sur- 
face of the skin or mucous membrane, they induce 
redness, heat and pain, indicating an increased deter- 
mination of blood to the part. These symptoms vary 
in intensity according to the state of concentration of 
the liquid and the length of time during which it re- 
mains in contact with the surface, and they may pass 
on from this condition of irritation to one of actual 
inflammation" 

* Bacchus, p. 340. 
t Use and Abuse of Alcohol, p. 5-7. 
3* 



58 ALCOHOL AS A STIMULANT. 

65. " Our best knowledge, however, of the influence 
of Alcohol upon the vital actions of the Animal tis- 
sues is derived from microscopic observations upon 
the circulation of blood in the web of the Frog's foot. 
If Alcohol be applied to this membrane in a very 
dilute state, its first effect is to quicken the movement 
of blood through the vessels, which are at the same 
time rather contracted than dilated. But this state of 
things gradually gives place to the opposite ; for, after 
a time, which varies with the degree of dilution of the 
Alcohol, the circulation becomes retarded and the 
vessels dilated, and a further time elapses before the 
original condition is recovered. If the Alcohol have 
been applied at first, however, in a less dilute form, 
the first stage is not observed, but a retardation of the 
flow of blood is immediately brought about and a 
considerable dilitation of the vessels takes place. The 
retardation may be such as to amount in some parts 
to a complete stagnation ; and here it is noticed that 
the red -corpuscles, (blood globules,) become crowded 
together, and that their natural form is lost ; their col- 
oring matter also being diffused through the liquor 
sanguinis (liquid in which they swim). Around the 
parte in which the stagnation is witnessed, however, 
there is generally a border in which the blood flows 
with increased rapidity. Now this perverted state 
may gradually give place to the natural condition, if 
the stimulus be only applied for a short time ; but if 



ALCOHOL AS A STIMULANT. 59 

the contact of concentrated Alcohol be prolonged, it 
becomes obvious that the tissue has been killed ; for 
the circulation is never re-established in it, and it is 
at last separated by gangrene, (death of the part.) 
We rarely witness inflammation in cold-blooded ani- 
mals ; but this process is liable to be excited in man 
and warm-blooded animals, by the contact of Alco- 
holic fluids with living tissues, if the contact be suffi- 
ciently prolonged and the Alcohol sufficiently concen- 
trated." 

66. Alcohol not a tonic. — " Now the inference to be 
drawn from the preceding details is this, that Alcohol, 
when applied to the living tissues exalts for a time 
their vital activity, but that this exaltation is tem- 
porary only, and is followed by a corresponding 
depression. And further, that when the Alcohol is in 
a state of sufficient concentration to act more poten- 
tially, its exhausting or depressing effect is manifested 
without any previous stage of excitement. This infer- 
ence is in precise accordance with that to which we 
are conducted by observation of the effects of Alcohol 
upon the system at large ; and we are justified, there- 
fore, in regarding Alcohol as belonging to the class 
of stimulants, and as subject to the laws of their oper- 
ation. It has been affirmed by some that Alcohol in 
small doses is tonic, (strength or vigor-imparting,) but 
of this there is no adequate proof. The property of 



60 ALCOHOL AS A STIMULANT. 

tonic remedies is to increase the vital contractility of 
the animal solids in general, but more especially that 
of the walls of the blood vessels. Now although some 
slight effect of this kind is at first manifested after the 
application of very dilute Alcohol to a living mem- 
brane, yet it is very transitory, and is succeeded by a 
much longer period of diminution of the tonic con- 
tractility of the walls of the blood vessels. The sup- 
posed tonic properties of Alcohol in small doses are 
really but a manifestation of its stimulant effects." 

67. HumboWs results. — Various other experiments 
confirm this view of the effects of Alcohol on the ani- 
mal tissues ; and those of Humbolt are peculiarly val- 
uable as regards its special capability of producing a 
temporary excitement of nervous power. "When 
the crural nerve," he says, " of a full grown and lively 
frog was immersed in Alcohol, if the leg was already 
exhausted by galvanization, the Alcohol evidently 
increased its excitability. If the nerve was left in it 
for some time, its excitability was completely exhaust- 
ed. Its application exhausted instantaneously the 
excitability of young animals, birds, worms, and 
insects. If the tail of an Earth worm or Leech be 
dipped for only four seconds in Alcohol, it becomes 
stiff and inexcitable as far as it is immersed; and al- 
though in frogs and puppies this state of rigidity could 
sometimes be removed, in those animals it never 



ALCOHOL AS A STIMULANT. 61 

could." Other and numerous authorities might be 
cited, and further experiments adduced, illustrative 
of these points, but there is no space, nor can they be 
necessary. To suppose that any thing can be actually 
gained to the healthy system by Alcoholic stimulation 
is the grossest delusion. So long as action and re- 
action are equal, and nature strives perpetually for 
compensation, so long will Alcoholic excitement work 
its own retribution — the transient heightening of 
vital activity affording only an extra momentum for 
sinking its powers to the lowest state of prostration. 
Alcohol can, therefore, minister to the enjoyment of 
the present hour only by plundering the future. 

68. Its relation to appetite for food. — In the first glow 
of Alcoholic excitement and general stimulation of 
the functions, an individual feels an unnatural demand 
for food, and forthwith congratulates himself upon his 
improved appetite and digestion. But that extra de- 
mand is fictitious — a sheer fraud upon the system. 
It corresponds to no actual want, and is only a means 
of conveying into the body a larger amount of nour- 
ishment than it requires or can use. This excess of 
food becomes a fruitful source of disorder. Alcoholic 
liquors cannot carry through the work which they 
begin. Having inveigled into the system a larger 
than necessary allowance of food, they are not only pow- 
erless to relieve it of the encumbrance, but actually 



62 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 

obstruct those processes of assimilation and excre- 
tion which are the. natural sequel of digestion. To 
the healthy man, these liquors are only instruments of 
.gluttony, enabling him to gorge his system with more 
alimentary matter than were otherwise possible. If 
spirits are habitually used as an excitant of appetite, 
the digestive apparatus loses its natural tone, and be- 
comes, from habitual use, unable to act without the 
aid of foreign stimulants. 



YIIL BELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 

69. Can it protect from contagion ? — It has been also 
pertinaciously asserted that Alcohol has the power 
of arming the human system against the invasion of 
epidemic and contagious diseases. But this statement 
is at palpable variance with both reason and experience. 
The only resistance to the assaults of contagion, which 
the system is capable of making, is that which is af- 
forded by the healthful and vigorous exercise of all 
its functions, which constitutes the highest condition 
of health. It is when its tone is depressed, the circu- 
lation sluggish, and the vital energies exhausted, that 
the constitution is least capable of self-defence from 
morbific and epidemic causes. A prolific soil is thus 
prepared in the system, and the seeds of disease find 
a ready lodgment there. Any cause, therefore, which 



RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 63 

tends to disorder the equable and harmonious action 
of the living mechanism, which breaks the full and 
equal current of vital activity into an alternate suc- 
cession of excitements and prostrations, now arousing 
it to inordinate effort, and then sinking it in languor 
and debility, is an efficient preparative for contagion. 
Such is pre-eminently the action of Alcohol, so that 
if we were to ransack the storehouses of both nature 
and art, we could probably find no substance more 
malignly adapted than this to level the safe-guards of 
health, and expose the defenceless constitution to the 
deadliest arrows of pestilence. 

70. Testimony upon the point. — In fatal accordance 
with these inductions of reason, is the testimony of 
universal experience. There is but one appalling con- 
clusion to be deduced from hospital records, medical 
statistics, and the vast array of facts which bear upon 
the question ; it is that among no class of society are 
the ravages of contagion so wide-spread and deadly, 
as those who are addicted to the use of Alcoholic 
beverages. They place beyond all possible contest 
the facts that epidemic malaria, and all forms of death- 
inducing miasms, and pestilential poisons, take effect 
with the utmost promptitude and certainty, upon con- 
stitutions vitiated by Alcoholic indulgence. The evi- 
dence upon this point is endless and concurrent. Says 
Dr. John W. Francis, " every one at all conversant 



64 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 

with the history of epidemics, knows full well the 
greater ravages which pestilence makes upon those 
individuals who indulge largely in spirituous pota- 
tions ; witness the accounts of the several visitations 
of yellow fever in different Ports and Towns of the 
U. S., and the records of the malignant cholera in 
New York, and elsewhere, in numerous sections of 
the union, in 1832 and 1834. It is forcibly imprinted 
on the memory of every medical man who studied 
the characteristics of this peculiar disorder, at our 
several cholera hospitals, and in private practice, that, 
of the whole number who sickened and died by it, a 
vast majority were composed of those who had been ad- 
dicted to the inordinate use of Alcoholic liquors."* 
Facts like the following are numerous. Says Dr. Car- 
penter,! " The nurses in the cholera hospital at Man- 
chester, were at first, worked six hours, and allowed 
to go home the other six, and the mortality was so 
great among them that there were fears of the failure 
of the supply. It was found, however, that they were 
much given to Alcoholic potations (with the idea, 
probably of increasing their power of resisting the 
malady) during their leisure hours ; and they were 
therefore confined to the hospital, and debarred from 
obtaining more than a small allowance of Alcoholic 
drink ; after which not a single fresh case occurred 
among them." 

* Bacchus, p. 465. 
t Use and Abuse of Alcoholic Liquors, p. 70, 



KELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 65 

71. Alcohol an efficient cause of disease, — Whatever 
may be the popular infatuation, it is evident from 
what has been previously stated, that, so far from 
being the conservator of health, Alcohol is an active 
and powerful cause of disease. There is no one point 
upon which all candid and intelligent physicians are 
more entirely agreed than this. Passing as it does 
into every part of the organism, interfering with all 
the normal changes of the body, respiration, circula- 
tion, nutrition, how is any other result possible ? 
Not only do Alcoholic liquors, by their potent 
physiological perversions, in numerous cases, predis- 
pose the system to disorder, arouse its latent tenden- 
cies to disease, and aggravate existing maladies, but 
they are the distinct cause, in unnumbered instances, 
of positive and fatal maladies. I have not space, nor 
does it belong to my purpose, to enter into details 
upon this point ; nor, indeed, would it yet be appro- 
priate in a work designed for popular reading. Until 
Physiological information becomes more widely dif- 
fused, questions of this sort will continue to belong to 
the Doctors. I may, however, make an extract or 
two in passing the subject. 

72. Diseases of the Stomach. — Says Dr. J. W. Fran- 
cis, in the admirable paper above quoted : " Every 
body knows that the stomach, although armed with 
vast conservative powers, is compelled, at length, to 



66 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 

surrender to so efficient a conqueror as Alcohol. Its 
sufferings, though severe, are too often unheeded. 
Its most conspicuous changes, upon inspection, are the 
conditions of the mucous, or villous coat ; softened, or 
removed by absorption, in its greater, or cardiac ex- 
tremity, while nearer its smaller, or pyloric portion, 
this membrane, in a majority of cases, is 'thickened, 
of a slaty color, with its surface uneven, or nippled — 
the results of chronic irritation. In other instances, 
the mucous coat is seen studded with highly-colored 
appearances of vascular fullness ; in inebriates, sud- 
denly destroyed by drinking cold water in a state of 
high excitement ; and, in very warm weather, I have 
found this vascular peculiarity more diffused and more 
varied, with marks of abrasion. In every immoder- 
ately warm summer, we have examples of this patho- 
logical nature. In the ardent summer of 1825, I 
examined about thirty cases of death by cold water, 
in nearly all of whom were found this morbid altera- 
tion of the stomach." 

73 Dr. Beaumont's Observations. — The case, so often 
quoted, of Alexis St. Martin, a Canadian soldier, who 
had a gun-shot wound in the stomach, which healed, 
leaving a permanent opening, is of great importance 
in this connexion. He was healthy and usually tem- 
perate, but occasionally indulged in the use of spirits, 
the results of which could be seen, by direct observa- 



RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 67 

tion, through the opening in the walls of his stomach. 
Says the late Dr. Beaumont, the able physician, who 
made the observations and described his case, under 
date July 28, 1833 : " Stomach not healthy, some 
erythema (inflammation) and apthous (ulcerous) 
patches on the mucous surface. St. Martin has been 
drinking ardent spirits pretty freely, for eight or ten 
days past ; complains of no pain, nor shows symp- 
toms of general indisposition ; says he feels well and 
has a good appetite. August 1st. — Inner membrane 
of the stomach unusually morbid ; the erythematous 
appearance more extensive, and spots more livid than 
usual, from the surface of which exuded small drops 
of grumous (thick, clotted) blood ; the apthous patch- 
es larger and more numerous ; the mucous covering 
thicker than common, and the secretions much more 
vitiated. The gastric fluids extracted this morning 
were mixed with a large proportion of thick, ropy 
mucous, and considerable muco-purulent (diseased) 
matter, slightly tinged with blood, resembling the dis- 
charge from the bowels in some cases of chronic dys- 
entery." 

74. Alcohol produces Internal Disease, when the patient 
is apparently well. — Let it be noticed that all this 
actual and visible disease of the stomach existed with- 
out any remarkable or peculiar external symtoms; 
"for," continues Dr. Beaumont, "St. Martin com- 



68 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 

plains of no symptoms indicating any general de- 
rangement of the system, except an uneasy sensation, 
and a tenderness at the pit of the stomach, and some 
virtigo, (swimming of the head,) with dimness and 
yellowness of vision on stooping down and rising 
again ; has a thin, yellowish brown coat on his tongue, 
pulse uniform and regular, appetite good, rests quietly, 
and sleeps as usual." Dr. Beaumont further states 
that " disordered appearances, similar to those men- 
tioned above, have frequently presented themselves 
in the course of my experiments and observations. 
They have, generally, but not always, succeeded to 
some apparent cause. Improper indulgence in eating 
and drinking, has been the most common precursor of 
these diseased conditions of the stomach. The free 
use of ardent spirits, wine, beer, or any intoxicating 
liquor, when continued for some days, has invariably pro- 
duced these morbid changes. 11 

75. How Alcohol Diseases the Liver. — Diseased livers 
are among the most common and universal results of 
Alcoholic derangement. Much of it is probably due 
to the direct irritating action of Alcohol upon the 
delicate tissue of the organ, but more is caused by 
the indirect action of the stimulant. It is one of the 
duties of the liver to separate from the blood any 
excess of hydro-carbon which it may contain. Now, 
the effect of Alcohol is greatly to increase the propor- 



EELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 69 

tion of this kind of matter in the system. This it 
does, both by stimulating the appetite to take more 
food than the organism requires, and also by prevent- 
ing, as we have seen (57), the natural oxidation of 
the constituents of the blood and their removal by 
the lungs. The removal of this excess of carbona- 
ceous matter falls to the lot of the liver, which is thus 
habitually overworked, and, sooner or later, becomes 
the seat of chronic disease. This effect becomes much 
more marked in warm climates, where the respiratory 
function is least active. If Alcohol be taken to 
quicken the appetite, diseased liver is almost certain 
to follow. 

76. Changes wrought by Alcohol in the Liver, — Dr. 
Francis again remarks: "Intemperance exercises a 
singularly direct and potent influence on the liver. 
The researches of the Pathologist have led him to de- 
scribe several striking alterations in it. Of all the ab- 
dominal organs perhaps this suffers most, and hence 
the despondency so often consequent upon the vice of 
hard drinking. The liver may become, by habitual 
intoxication, preternaturally hard or schirrous. It may 
be studded with tubercles, and these may be more or 
less deep-seated in its texture, or superfical, or without 
suppuration; its whole structure may also be changed; 
it may be obstructed and become extraordinarily en- 
larged ; and, it is worthy of remark, that the inordinate 



70 RELATION OF ALCOHOL TO DISEASE. 

plethora (fulness) of the blood-vessels which so gener- 
ally accompanies excess in eating and hard drinking, 
here evinces its detrimental influence in the most pal- 
pable manner. I once asked old Mr. Fife, the Anat- 
omist, at Edinburgh, who was many years dissector 
at the University, how great was the largest sized liver 
he had ever encountered in his preparations of dead 
bodies for collegiate purposes. He answered, 'fifty 
pounds,' and this occurred in the person of an ine- 
briate, who had long lived in the East Indies. When 
we consider that the ordinary weight of this organ in 
a healthy state may vary from four to seven, or eight 
or nine pounds, it might have been inferred that such 
a formidable liver would have created bile enough for 
a whole army ; yet this man died with a deficiency of 
this secretion. The livers of those who abuse their 
constitutions by Alcohol, are, however, generally pre- 
ternaturally diminished, of a pale straw color, with 
few traces of blood-vessels, and in a hardened or in- 
durated state ; this contracted state doubtless follows 
the enlarged condition, usually the result of long 
continued disease in this organ." 

77. These passages exemplify the ravages of Alcohol 
among some of the most important organs of the 
human structure. The insidious agent borne by the 
circulating current to every part, sets up with more or 
less violence its disorganizing action in each locality, 



ALCOHOL A POISON. 71 

which, according to circumstances of time or tempera- 
ment, breaks out as malignant disease, either of the 
stomach, or lungs, the liver, heart, kidneys, skin, or 
brain. A volume, nay, a library, might be filled with 
similar details of the morbid changes and pathology 
consequent upon inebriety, and the records of observ- 
ed cases. Medical works are full of them, and there 
the inquiry may be best pursued. 



IX. ALCOHOL A POISON. 

78. Definition of a Poison. — There is but one word 
in our language which describes the relation of Alcohol 
to the healthy human system, and that word is poison. 
u A poison," says Webster, " is any agent capable of 
producing a morbid, noxious, or dangerous effect 
upon any thing endowed with life." We, therefore, 
characterize that assemblage of " morbid," " noxious," 
and " dangerous effects" which we have shown to be 
produced by Alcohol, as products of poisoning. 

79. Etymology and Imjport of the word u Intoxicate" — 
The familiar terms of universal speech bear a witness 
upon this point. When persons have taken sufficient 
Alcohol to affect them, they are said to be intoxicated, 
the literal meaning of which is 'poisoned. The word 
is derived from Toxicum, the Latin for poison ; from 
this we have the word toxicology, which signifies the 



72 ALCOHOL A POISON. 

science which treats of poisoning and poisons. We 
have also toxic, agents which mean poisons, and intox- 
ication, which signifies the state or condition of being 
poisoned. This state is, however, limited, by general 
acceptance, to those "morbid," " noxious," and " dan- 
gerous effects" produced upon the nervous system, 
which are accompanied by mental disturbance, delirium, 
or frenzy. Furthermore, it may be observed that 
Alcohol is universally ranked among poisons by Phy- 
siologists, Chemists, Physicians, Toxicologists, and all 
who have experimented, studied, and written upon 
the subject, and who, therefore, best understand it. 

80. Modes of action of Poisons. — According to Toxi- 
cologists there are two different modes of action by 
which poisons destroy life. Some poisons when taken 
into the stomach produce a sudden and stunning effect 
upon the nerves, which reacts upon the heart, through 
the sympathetic system, suspending its action, and 
causing death in the same manner as would a succes- 
sion of severe blows upon the pit of the stomach. 
This is the promptest mode by which poisons produce 
death. Others, when swallowed, are more or less 
rapidly absorbed into the blood, and, being distributed 
throughout the system, produce their morbid and fatal 
effects upon its various part-s and organs (103). Now, 
Alcohol may act to destroy life in both these ways. 
In some experiments on Alcoholic poisoning made by 



ALCOHOL A POISON. 73 

Dr. Christison and others, the total loss of sensibility 
and voluntary power so instantaneously followed the 
introduction of the poison into the stomach, especially 
when it was introduced in a concentrated form, as 
not to admit the idea that absorption could have taken 
place to any considerable extent. This can only occur 
where Alcohol is taken in large quantities, and in a 
highly concentrated state. In its more diluted shape, as 
commonly used, it is always absorbed, and produces in 
the system the various disorganizing and poisonous 
effects which have been described in the previous 
pages. The way in which death is brought about by 
Alcohol diluted and absorbed, will be noticed in a future 
paragraph (112.) 

81. Poisons in small quantities. — Let it not be objected 
to Alcohol as a poison, that, in small or " moderate ' ; 
qantities, it does not kill. It is not necessary to the 
action of poisons, that they be always swallowed in 
fatal doses. Besides, this objection, if admissible, 
would annihilate all poisons, for there are none that 
may not be, and few that are not administered in mi- 
nute doses, without fatal effects. Physicians habitu- 
ally prescribe the most active poisons as remedies, to 
combat disease. Corrosive Sublimate, for example, is 
used in rheumatism, diseases of the bones, scrofulous 
affections, nervous disorders, and in dropsy. Arsenic 
is given in intermittent fevers, periodical headaches, 
chronic affections of the skin, neuralgia, apoplexy, 
4 



74 ALCOHOL A POISON. 

and locked-jaw. Sulphuric Acid (Oil of Vitriol) is ad- 
ministered as a refrigerant in fevers, to diminish un- 
natural heat and thirst ; also, to check profuse sweat- 
ing in consumption, and internal hemorrhage of the 
stomach ; it is also given in some forms of skin dis- 
eases and dyspepsia. Mtric Acid (Aqua Fortis) is em- 
ployed in heart-burn, to dissolve calcareous and phos- 
phatic deposits, and also, in various other diseases. 
These were, indeed, given as medicines, but they have 
also been administered in equal, and even larger doses 
to the healthy human system, as pure poisons, with- 
out fatal results. 

82. Medicinal and Poisonous action. — It thus appears 
that the same substance, without alteration of proper- 
ties, may act both as a poison and as a medicine. But 
are both these actions the same ? Assuredly not. 
The difference depends upon the state of the constitu- 
tion that receives them. Upon the healthy sys- 
tem, no matter how much or how little may be 
used, their action is always, and essentially poisonous. 
It is upon the diseased system that their effect, in 
proper amount, is said to be medicinal. There is, 
therefore, no escape from the conclusion, that Alcohol, 
in whatever form or quantity, is a poison in all the 
common cases of its employment ; and can only rank 
among medicines, when placed there *by the cautious 
and candid physician, and judiciously used in cases of 
disease. 



INFLUENCE OF ALCOHOL 



UPON THE 



BRAIN AND ITS OFFICES 



X. VALUE OF. THE BKAIN IN THE HUMAN 
CONSTITUTION. 

83. The organs of the tody have a variable rank. — 
Although no part of the system is without its use, 
and all its various organs and functions contribute 
harmoniously to the advancement of its grand pur- 
poses, yet these several parts have very unequal values 
in the maintenance of the general economy. A man 
may lose his hands or his feet, his organs of sight, or 
those of hearing, or various internal parts may be 
perverted, or paralyzed by disease ; yet, if the Brain is 
untouched, the essential man still remains. In the 
minor circumstances of his being, he may have been 
rudely jostled, yet he still holds his high and respon- 
sible relation with the universe. But let this material 
organ become equally disordered, and the lights of 
the universe are suddenly quenched ; manhood with 

(75) 



76 VALUE OF THE BKAIN 

all its august considerations has vanished, and the 
wreck that remains awakens in us a profounder sad- 
ness than even the contemplation of the dead. 

84. The spiritual principle has its material organ. — 
The glory of human nature consists in its intellectual 
and moral capabilities, in the ability to discover truth, 
in the capacity of discriminating, and the power of 
choosing between right and wrong. These faculties 
constitute man's spiritual nature, and they have a lo- 
cal seat in his bodily system. It is agreed by all 
Physiologists, that the Brain is the organ and instru- 
ment of the mind ; it is, therefore, the noblest portion 
of the physical fabric — that for which all its other 
parts were made. 

85. Office of the double set of nerves. — The Brain is 
the great centre of the nervous system. From it pass- 
es a double set of nerve lines which divide and sub- 
divide until they pervade the whole fabric. One set 
goes to the surface of the body, and there collects 
impressions of the surrounding universe — its grada- 
tions of heat and cold, of light and colors, of sound 
and melody, and all its multiform contacts ; these, in 
the shape of sensations, pour along the sensory fila- 
ments to the great nervous centre and. seat of con- 
sciousness. The other set of nerve fines goes to the 
muscles, and it is along these that the will transmits 



IN rHE HUMAN CONSTITUTION. 77 

its orders to those instruments of motion, and thus 
commands the movements of the body. The Brain 
is thus a focus into which, for each living man, a uni- 
verse is gathered and reproduced ; it is also the source 
and spring of every form of human power. 

86. Grandeur of the office of the brain. — In this nar- 
row chamber, which is so small that a man's hand 
may cover it, what grand events transpire ! Within 
its walls occur the sublimest order of phenomena. 
The thoughts that have revolutionized the world 
originated here ! Every achievement which sheds 
glory upon our race, projects which involve all nations 
in their operation, which radiate impulses to the ends 
of the earth, and send undulations of power down the 
current of time for thousands of years, originate 
here ! Acts that bless mankind in their beneficence, 
as well as those which darken it in the shadow of their 
malignity, alike have originated here ! Nay, did not 
all inventions and discoveries, all arts and literature, 
and civilization itself come into existence first in the 
human Brain ? 

87. A Universe dwells within it. — It is customary to 
point to the heavens as the sublimest object that can 
engage human attention ; and certainly, the contem- 
plation of its magnificent scenery must ever awaken 
the profoundest wonder. Those ponderous revolvent 



78 VALUE OF THE BRAIN. 

orbs, sweeping through the shoreless amplitudes, as if 
hurrying downward to the vortex of chaos, and yet 
returning through their grand celestial circuits, with 
the punctuality of the All- Controlling ; those gorgeous 
galaxies of stars thick strewn through the skies, and 
sunk so deep in the abysses of space as to be brought 
down to our gaze only through telescopic enchant- 
ment — what are they all but symbols of the Infinite, 
fit and awful emblems of Eternity ? And yet these 
heavens are duplicated in the Brain of the Astrono- 
mer. The eye of Arrago may have been darkened 
in blindness, yet in his Brain the planets still careered 
in their majestic paths. Even the last splendid ex- 
tension of our planetary system, was it not purely a 
triumph of thought ? Within the Brain of Leverrier, 
those planets rolled and circled through their magnifi- 
cent orbits, but with motions so irregular and perturb- 
ed, that the young Astronomer feels the incomplete- 
ness of the system. In the solitude of his study, he 
grapples with the mighty problem, and discovers a 
new planet in the recesses of Ms own Brain. The Tel- 
escopist fulfils the immortal prophecy, and the heav- 
ens acknowledge their vindicated harmonies. 

88. Sacredness of the souVs material temple. — So, too, 
the whole panorama of life and being, as it unrolls in 
our experience, leaves its mystic impression upon this 
exquisite organ. Crowds of the living inhabit its 



CONTROLLED BY MATERIAL CONDITIONS. 79 

windings, and the dead also rest in its silent sepul- 
chres. How fearfully mysterious are its offices ! It is 
the sacredest material thing that Grod has made ! It 
is, indeed, a "Laboratory of Wonders, the very mas- 
terpiece of the Almighty." 

XI. EXERCISE OF THE BRAIN" CONTROLLED 
BY MATERIAL CONDITIONS. 

89. Now the Brain is a part of the bodily constitu- 
tion, and is hence subject to its laws ; it therefore can- 
not exercise these high functions of thought, reflection, 
and reason, except upon certain unalterable physical 
conditions. It now becomes our business to inquire 
something concerning what these conditions are. 

90. Pressure upon the Brain puts an end to thought — 
Being of a soft and delicate structure, the Brain is 
covered and protected by a strong bony case, which 
forms the skull. Sometimes parts of the skull are de- 
stroyed, or removed by accident or disease, leaving 
the naked Brain exposed. If, in this case, pressure 
be made upon it, every mental manifestation instantly 
ceases ; with the removal of the pressure, it returns. 
It has been found, that by such compression upon the 
Brain conversation was arrested in the midst of a sen- 
tence, and when removed it was resumed at the same 
point. In a case related by Sir Astley Cooper, con- 
sciousness, which had been suspended for several 



80 EXERCISE OF THE BRAIN 

months, was restored bj removing a portion of the 
skull which pressed upon the Brain. Great internal 
pressure, as by the blood in apoplexy, also destroys 
consciousness and all mental action. 

91. A large supply of blood to the Brain essential to 
Mental action. — The activity of the Brain is also de- 
pendent upon a full supply of arterialized blood. 
This is more indispensable to the Cerebral and Nerv- 
ous tissue than to any other portion of the body. The 
weight of the Brain is upon an average -^j that of the 
entire body, and yet it is estimated by different Phys- 
iologists to receive from } to T \ of all the blood 
which is distributed to the system. If the circulation 
of blood through the Brain be suspended but for an 
instant, the will and all voluntary power is prostrated, 
mentality is extinguished, total insensibility occurs, 
and continues until the circulation is restored. This 
is proved in numerous ways, but the following exper- 
iment of Sir Astley Cooper is very satisfactory. He 
tied the carotoid arteries in a Dog, so that no blood 
could enter the Brain except what passed through the 
vertebral trunks. He then compressed these trunks, 
so as to check the current, and immediately insensi- 
bility came on, the animal at the same time falling 
powerless As soon as the blood was re-admitted, the 
animal recovered its consciousness and voluntary 
power, and stood upon its legs again. 



CONTROLLED BY MATERIAL CONDITIONS. 81 

92. The intellectual Activity of the Brain requires that 
the blood should be very pure. — But the due activity of 
the Brain is not merely dependent upon a constant and 
ample supply of blood ; it requires that this blood 
should be in a state of extreme purity — should be 
freed from its Carbonic Acid and other products of the 
decomposition of the body! If this excretion of dead 
compounds is in any manner checked or interfered 
with, the mind is immediately affected. In the case of 
ill-ventillated apartments, Carbonic Acid Gras accumu- 
lates in the air. The effect of this accumulation is 
just in proportion' to its extent, to impede or suppress 
the liberation of Carbonic Acid from the lungs by res- 
piration. As it now gradually accumulates in the 
blood, and is sent through the Brain, the keen edge is, 
removed from the mind ; there come on an indisposi- 
tion to mental exertion, blunted sensibility, obtuse - 
ness of the intellectual and moral faculties, and, finally, 
if the cause continues, a state of complete unconscious- 
ness, nor can any energy of will avail to avert these 
consequences. 

93. The blood which enters the Brain must be highly 
charged with Oxygen. — But the prime condition of intel- 
lectual action is, that the torrent of blood which rolls 
through the Brain should come fresh from the foun- 
tain of respiration, and be charged to its highest nor- 
mal capacity with Oxygen gas. We have repeatedly 

4* 



82 EXERCISE OF THE BRAIN 

stated (50, 51) that this gas is the universal motive 
power of Animal Life. Throughout all the gradations 
of animated being, the intelligence and power of each 
Tribe is rigidly proportioned to the amount of this 
gas consumed. We have also seen that the nature of 
Oxygen is disorganizing; it is commissioned, within 
the body as without, only to burn and destroy. Now 
the Brain furnishes no exception to this mode of its 
action ; on the contrary, disorganizing changes must 
go forward in this Organ at a rate which will corres- 
pond with the supply of the Destructive Agent. The 
functional activity of the Brain, that is, the action of 
the Intellectual and Moral faculties, involves, therefore, 
disintegration of its mass by the agency of Oxygen, 
and the chemical union of this gas with the constitu- 
ents of its tissue. 

94. Dependence of Mental Activity upon the Phosphatic 
constituents of the Brain. — An interesting illustration 
and confirmation of this action of Oxygen within the 
Brain is found in the increase of compounds of phos- 
phorus in the liquid passed by the kidneys, when there 
has been any unusual demand upon the nervous 
power. "No others of the soft tissues (beside the 
Brain and nerves) contain any large amount of phos- 
phorus ; and the marked increase in these deposits 
which has been continually observed to accompany 
long continued wear of mind, whether by intellectual 



CONTROLLED BY MATERIAL CONDITIONS. 83 

exertion or by excitement of the feelings, and which 
follows any temporary strain upon its powers, can 
scarcely be set down to any other cause. The most 
satisfactory proof is to be found in cases in which there 
is a periodical demand upon the mental powers. In 
cases in which constant and severe intellectual exer- 
tion has impaired the nutrition of the Brain, and has 
consequently weakened the mental power, it is also 
found that any premature attempt to renew the activ- 
ity of its exercise, causes the reappearance of the ex- 
cessive Phosphatic discharge indicative of an undue 
waste of nervous matter." (Carpenter.) 

95. Intellectual power demands a healthful nutrition 
of the Brain. — But where Disintegration is a part of 
the essential economy of nature, there must also be 
Nutrition ; Eeparative operations must follow Destruc- 
tive ones. When the mind has been long acting 
through its instrument, the Brain, a sense of fatigue 
is experienced, and there is an irresistible tendency to 
sleep. This is the demand of nature for compensation. 
The Brain must have repose, so that the nutritive, re- 
constructing processes may restore the lost equilibrium. 
Hence, if there has been an unusual demand upon the 
powers of the Brain, whether by long continued and 
severe exercise of the intellect, by excitement of the 
emotions, or by the combination of both, in that state 
of anxiety which the circumstances of man's condition 



84 EXERCISE OF THE BRAIN 

very often induce, and where the natural tendency to 
sleep has been habitually resisted by a strong effort of 
the will, injurious results are sure to follow ; the bod- 
ily health breaks down, and too frequently, the mind 
itself is permanently enfeebled. It is obvious that the 
nutrition of the Cerebral system has become complete- 
ly deranged, and that its tissue is no longer formed in 
a manner requisite for the discharge of its healthy 
offices. 

96. Excess of Blood in the Brain Disorders the Mind. 
— Again, there is exaltation and disturbance of the 
functions of the Brain, when the circulation through 
it is increased to an unwonted degree. This is par- 
ticularly noticed in those affections of the Brain which 
border on inflammation, to which the terms Active 
Congestion, and Determination of Blood, have been ap- 
plied. We have, in such cases, excitement, or excess- 
ive activity of the Mental Powers. 

97. The Intellectual and Moral Powers may be Over- 
set by the Respiration of Gases. But the most striking 
example of the despotic subjection of our Nobler Na- 
ture to the action of Physical Agents, is furnished by 
the influence of various vapors, or gases, taken into 
the system by breathing, and to which reference has 
already been made (49). Some kinds of air so act 
upon the Brain and Imaginative Faculties, as to create 



CONTROLLED BY MATERIAL CONDITIONS. 85 

around the Inhaler a world of delightful visions ; 
others suddenly rouse the faculties to the utmost de- 
lirium of ungovernable excitement. Sometimes the 
Moral and Mental energies are steadily and gradually 
undermined ; or, again, they may be instantaneously 
paralyzed. The reason of this is, that these various 
kinds of air, by entering the lungs, get prompt ad- 
mission to the system. By their energetic chemical 
affinities, they break in upon the natural course of 
changes, and as the integrity and harmonious opera- 
tion of the Mind depends upon these changes, its de- 
rangement is inevitable. 

98. -Diseased Mind involves Diseased Brain. — The in- 
timate dependence of the Intellectual and Moral 
powers upon their material Organ, is further and very 
strikingly shown, by the fact now generally admitted 
by the most enlightened Physiologists and Physicians, 
that disordered or insane manifestations of mind, are 
the consequence of bodily, or Brain disease. Says 
Dr. Ray* : " It is an undoubted truth, that the mani- 
festations of the intellect, and those of the sentiments, 
propensities and passions, or generally of the intel- 
lectual and affective powers, are connected with, and 
dependent upon the Brain. It follows, then, that ab- 
normal conditions of those powers are connected with 
abnormal conditions of the Brain; but this is not 

* Medical Jurisprudence, of Insanity, p. 65, 1853. 



86 EXERCISE OF THE BRAIN 

merely a matter of inference. The dissections of 
many eminent observers, among whom it is enough 
to mention the names of Greding, Calmeil, Foville, 
Falret, Gall, and Spurzheim, Bayle, Esquirol and 
Georget, have placed it beyond a doubt ; and no patho- 
logical fact is better established — though its correct- 
ness was for a long while doubted — than that devia- 
tions from the healthy structure are generally present- 
ed in the Brains of insane subj ects. In the few cases 
where such appearances have not been observed, it is 
justly concluded that death took place before the de- 
viation was sufficiently great to be perceptible — a phe- 
nomenon not rare in affections of other Organs." 
Again : " Before describing the phenomena of mania, 
it should be distinctly understood that it is, first, a 
disease of the Brain ; and, secondly, that, in its vari- 
ous grades and forms, it observes the same laws as 
diseases of other Organs." 

99. Authority of Drs. Beck and Esquirol. — Says Dr. 
Beck :.* " The causes of insanity are usually divided 
into physical and moral, or bodily and mental ; but a 
separation of this nature is not conducive to just views 
of the disease. Insanity is essentially a bodily dis- 
ease, and the Moral causes operate in producing it as 
they do in producing other complaints." Says the 
late celebrated Dr. Esquirol, perhaps the first authority 

* Elements of Medical Jurisprudence, vol. 1, p. 725, 10th ed., 1850. 



CONTEOLLED BY MATEKIAL CONDITIONS. 87 

of his time in all matters pertaining to alienation of 
mind :.* ■ " Few bodies of Lunatics are now examined, 
in which there are not proved to exist, at the same 
time, softenings and tubercles of the Brain, injections 
and lesions of its meninges (convolutions), serous 
effusions in its cavities, &c, while, at the period when 
we made our earliest investigations, we only kept ac- 
count of obvious and manifest alterations." 

100. Material Changes do not Constitute Mind.— In 
stating these facts, let me not be misapprehended, as 
intimating the doctrine that intellectual operations 
originate or consist in material changes of the Brain. 
I only say, that in the action of the Mind, through its 
material Organ, these changes intervene. Our mental 
being has its separate duration and separate destiny ; 
and yet, in this state of existence, it is involved with 
matter by certain inexorable conditions and laws, 
which it is of the highest consequence for us to know. 
I may here, with propriety, quote the beautiful lan- 
guage of Prof. Draper : f " Whilst, then, this body 
has ceased to be composed of the same identical parts 
which entered into its constitution a year ago, for 
those have passed away into the atmosphere, and new 
ones have taken their places, and processes of destruc- 
tion and renovation have been accomplished, these 

* Pritchard on Insanity, p. 214 
f Lecture on Atmospheric Air 



88 EXERCISE OF THE BRAIN 

necessary changes have left no impression on, and 
done no injury to the Intellectual Principle within. 
In an instant, and spontaneously, there come to recol- 
lection words which I have heard in early life, which 
have been registered on the tablets of the Brain ; and 
in dreams at night, as well as during the business of 
the day, there arise before me long-forgotten forms of 
scenery that I once beheld, the remembrance of trans- 
actions in which I have borne a part. If, in the 
midst of all this mutation and change, this hourly 
escape of dead atoms by respiration and other pro- 
cesses, this constant re-introduction of new matter in 
the form of food, and its transient continuance, as a 
part of a living mechanism, there still remains behind 
an Intelligent Principle, with all its affections and feel- 
ings, and acquisitions and knowledge, unaltered and 
untouched, do not these things declare plainly that, 
after the act of death shall have utterly broken down, 
and dissolved, and dispersed the parts of this organ- 
ized frame, there still shall remain that same Intel- 
lectual Principle unscathed, still bearing the impres- 
sion of whatever it has seen, whatever it has done, 
whatever it has endured ?" 

101. Importance of these views. — -The foregoing views 
are indispensable, in order that we may understand 
jbow it is that a material agent — a liquid taken into 
the human stomach — is capable of disordering the In- 



CONTROLLED BY MATERIAL CONDITIONS. 89 

tellectual and moral powers, and of working the pro- 
foundest revulsions in human conduct and character. 
I proceed to consider the relation of Alcohol to the 
Brain. 

XII. POISONS HAYE A LOCAL ACTION 
WITHIN THE SYSTEM. 

102. The Body has local attractions for the various 
atoms of food. — Among the many extraordinary attri- 
butes with which the living system is endowed, its 
power of analyzing food is by no means the least sur- 
prising. By proper processes of solution and selection, 
our mixed aliments are first converted into a uniform 
liquid, the blood. The system then analyzes, or 
takes to pieces, this blood to build up its various 
structures. The different elements are withdrawn, 
at different points, according to the local needs 
of the organism. Those mineral atoms that go to form 
bones, teeth, or nails, are taken out just where these 
parts require to grow. And so the elements of all the 
various tissues are separated or attracted out of the 
circulating current by special local affinities. At one 
place, the materials for the growth of hair may be 
needed, and* they are taken ; the nervous tissue demands 
phosphorized elements, and the muscular sulphurized, 
and they are accordingly yielded by the blood. The 
marvel of these interesting phenomena is greatly 
heightened, when we consider that the affinities are 



90 POISONS HAVE A LOCAL ACTION 

largely of a double nature, there being two symmetri- 
cal and corresponding sides to the body. 

103. The same great Law applies to the action of pois- 
ons. — But this remarkable Law is not limited in its 
application, to nutritive substances taken into the sys- 
tem; it extends, as everyone knows, to medicines 
which are administered to combat local diseases, and 
also to the action of poisons. Says Dr. Christison,* 
perhaps the highest English Authority upon this sub- 
ject — " Poisons are commonly, but I conceive errone- 
ously, said to affect remotely the general system. A 
few of them do, indeed, appear to affect a great num- 
ber of the Organs of the body, but much the larger 
proportion seem on the contrary to act on one or more 
Organs only, and not on the general system.' 1 

104. Examples of the Locals Action of Poisons. — 
Strychnine, for example, when introduced into the 

system, takes effect upon the spinal cord. Oil of 
tobacco paralyzes the heart. Arsenic inflames the 
mucus membrane of the alimentary passages. Mer- 
cury affects primarily the salivary glands and 
mouth ; Cantharides, the renal organs ; Chromate 
of Potash, the Conj unctiva, or lining membrane of the 
Eyelids. Iodine acts upon the Lymphatic glands; 
Manganese, upon the Liver ; and Lead fastens first upon 

* Treatise on Poisons, p. 17, 3d Ed. 



WITH IX THE SYSTEM. 91 

the muscles of the wrist, paralyzing them, and pro- 
ducing what is known among painters and white lead 
manufacturers as wrist-drop. The disturbance which 
these substances produce in the system may not be 
confined to a single part ; still the tendency is to select 
some one portion of the organism which first and most 
directly suffers from the action of the Poisonous 
Agent. 

105. Is Alcohol also governed hy this Law? — The 
question now arises, and it is one of deep significance, 
what, under the operation of this important Law, is 
the physiological destiny of Alcoholic Liquors ? What 
portion of the system do they seek out and fasten 
upon first, and by natural attraction ? These ques- 
tions are of the utmost import for, as we have before 
seen (78), there are immense differences in the value 
and importance of these parts and organs. This is 
the hinging point of the whole question. Does Alco- 
hol direct its main attack against the subordinate 
portions of the human constitution ? or, as if with 
infernal ambition, does it assault the very citadel of 
manhood, carrying its ravages into the sacred regions 
of intelligence and responsibility ? Alas ! the wail 
of humanity, echoed through long and weary ages 
from every clime under the sun, anticipates the re- 
sponse of science. 



92 ALCOHOL, A BRAIN POISON. 



XIII. ALCOHOL ATTRACTED TO THE CERE-. 
BRAL MATTER— IT IS A BRAIN POISON. 

106. Alcohol a Brain Poison. — It is to the apparatus 
of sense and thought, and Reason and Responsibility, 
the nervous system, and especially its great centre, the 
Brain, that Alcohol is first attracted after it has en- 
tered the circulatory system ; and this mechanism, 
the Soul's consecrated instrument, affords the chief 
theatre of its ravages. Were some inferior Organ of 
the body, whose functions are of a purely physical or 
chemical nature, the prominent object of Alcoholic in- 
vasion, the attitude of our question would be greatly 
changed. But Alcohol is specifically, and to all in- 
tents and purposes, a Cerebral Poison. It seizes, with 
its disorganizing energy, upon the Brain, that mysteri- 
ous part, whose steady and undisturbed action holds 
man in true and responsible relations with his family, 
with society, and with God ; and it is THIS fear- 
ful FACT THAT GIVES TO GOVERNMENT AND SOCIETY 
THEIR TREMENDOUS INTEREST IN THE QUESTION. 

107. Dr. Percy's Experiments and Conclusions. — The 
proofs of this statement are very conclusive. All the 
observed facts of Human Physiology substantiate it; 
but to place the point beyond question, an extensive 
series of experiments were instituted concerning it 



93 



upon the inferior animals, by Dr. Percy of Edinburgh. 
Of the propriety of extending to man, with due 
precautions, the physiological inferences drawn 
from experiments upon the lower animals, the 
universal practice of the Medical Profession bears 
witness ; for it is through this route that Physi- 
ology has made many of its most important ad- 
vances, while Toxicology, the science which investi- 
gates the action of poisons, is still more largely in- 
debted to this method of inquiry. Dr. Percy destroy- 
ed the life of the animals upon which he experimented, 
by introducing Alcohol into the stomach, and inject- 
ing it into various veins and arteries. After death, 
the Brain was extracted, sliced, placed in a glass ves- 
sel with some water, and the Alcohol separated by 
distillation. This process was repeated in a large 
number of cases. In announcing, at the close of his 
volume, the conclusions to which his experiments had 
led him, Dr. Percy observes — * " A remark may here 
be appropriately introduced respecting the situation in 
which the Alcohol may exist in the Brain. That, to a 
certain extent, it is diffused through the substance of 
the Brain, and that it is not all contained in the Cere- 
bral Vessels, will I think appear from the following 
circumstance : namely, that although I have subjected 
to analysis a much greater quantity of blood than can 

* Experimental inquiry concerning the presence of Alcohol in the 
ventricles of the Brain, p. 103. 



94 ALCOHOL, A BKAIN POISON. 

possibly be present within the cranium, yet I have in gen- 
eral been enabled to procure a much larger proportion of 
Alcohol from the Brain, than from all this quantity of 
blood. Indeed it would seem that a hind of affinity 
exists between Alcohol and the cerebral matter." Direct 
investigations of this sort undertaken for special scien- 
tific purposes, must of course be confined to inferior 
animals, and yet the resources of science are thus by no 
means exhausted ; for with strange infatuation men 
themselves volunteer to become the subjects of experi- 
ment. Dr. Percy's observations were not limited to the 
lower animals killed by poisoning with pure Alcohol. 
He also examined in the same manner the Brains of men 
who had destroyed their own lives by drinking Alco- 
hol in its common diluted form of spirituous liquors, 
and obtained the same marked result ; the extraction of 
Alcohol in considerable quantity from the cerebral matter, 
and that too, several days after the victims' demise. 

108. Observations of Drs. Lewis, GooJc, and Kirk. — 
The same fact is established by numerous other Medi- 
cal Authorities. A case occurred in Edinburgh in 
1840, described by Dr. Lewis, where Alcohol was de- 
tected in the substance of the Brain, while no Alcoholic 
odor could be detected in the fluid of the ventricles, 
(cavities,) nor indeed in any other part of the body.* 
"Dr. Cook of London, in his work on nervous dis- 

* Medical Examiner, N. S., vol. i., p. 239. 



ALCOHOL, A BKAIN POISON. 95 

eases, has stated the case of a man who was brought 
dead into Westminster Hospital, who had just drunk 
a quart of gin for a wager. The evidences of death 
being quite conclusive, he was immediately examined, 
and within the lateral ventricles of the Brain was 
found a considerable quantity of a limpid fluid dis- 
tinctly impregnated with gin, both to the sense of 
smell, and even to the test of inflammability. Dr. 
Kirk, of Scotland, has given a like fact by the dissec- 
tion of the dead body of an Inebriate. The fluid of 
the lateral ventricles of the Brain exhaled the smell 
of whisk} r , and, when he applied a candle to it in a 
spoon, it burnt with a lambent blue flame ?"* 

109. Observations- of Dr. J. W.Francis. — "I have 
repeatedly," remarks Dr. Francis, f "had cases partak- 
ing much of the same character, falling under my own 
inspection. Upon removing the bony covering of the 
Brain, the exhalation of Ardent Spirits, on several oc- 
casions, was strongly manifested to the olfactories of 
the bystanders, as also the effused fluid conspicuous for 
its quantity and quality. On one occasion, while hold- 
ing an inquest over the body of a drunkard suddenly 
cut off, some spectators who entered the room where 
the anatomical examination was made, asked what 
puncheon of rum we had opened." "We shall soon 
have occasion to notice still further evidence that the 
mind's organ is the first and principal object of Alco- 
holic assault and disturbance. 

* Dr. Francis's Paper in Bachus, p. 468. f Ibid- 



BRAIN DISEASE CAUSED BY ALCOHOL. 



XIV. BRAIN DISEASE CAUSED BY ALCOHOL. 

110. Brain disease induced by the moderate use of 
Alcohol. — Now Alcohol is too potent and fiery an 
Agent, and its disorganizing action is too varied and 
intense, to allow for a moment the supposition that it 
can often enter the Brain without the production of 
serious disorder. It is important also to notice that 
the attraction of Alcohol for the Cerebral Substance 
will cause that substance to be more affected than any 
other part or tissue by a very minute proportion of Al- 
cohol in the blood. We should, therefore, expect that 
the habitual employment of spirituous beverages, 
even in moderate quantities, would tend powerfully 
to the production of Brain disease ; and this is among 
the settled facts of Medical observation. The moder- 
ate use of Alcoholic Stimulants, lays the foundation 
of diseases in the Brain, by gradually modifying and 
altering the nutritive operations. The Physical and 
Chemical disorganization induced by Alcohol itself, 
the excess of blood urged Brain ward hy the stimulant, 
the succeeding stagnation, and the varying conditions 
of purity of the sanguinary current, all conspire to 
affect the vital properties of the Cerebral tissue, and 
undermine that series of nutritive and reparative 
changes which constitutes health. This condition of 
the Organ becomes a powerful predisposing cause to 
various maladies, such as Inflammation of the Brain 



BRAIN DISEASE CAUSED BY ALCOHOL. 97 

m its several forms, Congestion, Apoplexy, Epilepsy, 
and Paralysis, all of which, complaints are so much 
more frequent among those addicted to the use of 
spirituous Liquors, than among others, as to leave no 
room for question as to the share which these liquors 
had in bringing them on. These forms of Cerebral 
disease will. result from the use of Liquors in quanti- 
ties so limited as never to produce "intoxication," in 
the current acceptation of the term. 

111. Condition of the Brain induced by Drunkenness. 
— The freer use of Alcoholic mixtures produces pro- 
founder disorder of the Cerebral Organ ; its ravages 
are revealed by the dissector so that all may behold 
them ! Says Dr. Ray — " This increased action that 
takes place in drunkenness, degenerates after frequent 
repetition, into a permanent state of Irritation, which 
at last becomes real Inflammation. The coats of the 
vessels are thickened and less transparent than usual, 
and in some places they assume a varicose (enlarged) 
appearance. The Cerebral texture is less delicate and 
elastic, becoming either immoderately hard or soft. 
These appearances, to a greater or less extent, are 
found in the Brains of nearly all confirmed drunk- 
ards." Says Dr. J. W. Francis, in the admirable paper 
from which I have before quoted,* — " The Brain of 
the intemperate is the rallying point of much disor- 
* Bachus, p. 468. 

5 



98 BRAIN DISEASE CAUSED BY ALCOHOL. 

ganizing action. Dissections have shown preternatu- 
ral fullness of a venous character; the membranes of 
the Brain gorged with blood ; in some instances, where 
the patient has perished from protracted Delirium 
Tremens (118), traces of the inordinate operation of 
the poison have been most distinctly seen at the basi- 
lar or inferior portion of the skull, and a highly vas- 
cular or surcharged state of the whole Brain. The 
substance of the Brain itself is generally more or less 
invaded by serum, (watery portion of the blood,) and 
hence the uncommon moisture of its cut surfaces. In 
the lateral ventricles, (cavities,) as well as at the base 
of the Brain, large quantities of serum have also been 
remarked. Other post obit (after death) examinations 
of a similar sort might be stated, corroborative of this 
sad condition of the Brain, whose manifestations of 
deranged sensation too clearly showed how far removed 
from a sound condition were the faculties. Hence, on 
some occasions, upon an investigation into the Morbid 
Anatomy of the structural part of the Brain itself, we 
discover a preternatural softness of its substance, a 
pulpy disorganization, and that its texture has lost its 
distinctive peculiarities, not unlike the specimens of 
disorganization ascertained in some fatal cases of Ma- 
lignant Typhus." 

112. Uses of different parts of the Brain. — The reader 
will recollect that the upper and chief portion of the 



BRAIN DISEASE CAUSED BY ALCOHOL. 99 

Brain is termed the Cerebrum. This constitutes the 
main mass of the Organ, and is generally regarded as 
the seat of the higher Intellectual and Moral faculties. 
Below, this, and seated at the back of the head, is an- 
other portion of the Organ called the Cerebellum ; and 
it is commonly understood by Physiologists to be the 
seat of control of the movements and actions of the 
body. Below the Cerebellum, and connecting the 
Brain with the Spinal Cord, is a third and smaller 
portion of the nervous mass called the Medulla "■Oblon- 
gata. Several sets of nerves originate here, and, 
among them, those which control the respiratory func- 
tion, or the action of the lungs. 

113. Alcohol affects unequally different portions of the 
Brain. — How it causes Death. — The selective power of 
Alcohol, remarks Dr. Carpenter, appears to lead it 
first to attack the cerebrum ; the Intellectual Powers 
\eing affected before any disorder of sensation or motion 
manifests itself, and to this it seems to be limited in 
the first stages of intoxication. In the second stage of 
intoxication, there is not only a complete perversion 
of the intellectual powers, but the duties of the cere- 
bellum are also interfered with, as is shown by the un- 
steady, tremulous, and zigzag movements and di- 
minished control of the muscles. In the third stage 
of intoxication the offices of both cerebrum and cere- 
bellum appear to be completely suspended, and now 



100 MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 

the Medulla Oblongata is affected, as indicated by the 
embarrassed and difficult respiration. As already 
stated, (57,) the admixture of Alcohol with the blood 
has a tendency to give a Venous character to that of 
the arteries ; now, when, the respiration becomes im- 
perfect and obstructed, the blood will rapidly become 
more and more impure, until its influence upon the 
Medulla Oblongata is so directly poisonous that it can 
no longer perform its duties, the respiratory move- 
ments are utterly brought to a stand, and death takes 
place by asphyxia (suspended respiration) the same as 
in drowning, or strangling, or in narcotic poisoning by 
other substances. 



XV. MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 
PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. 

114. Disorder of the Mind. — If now, as has been abun- 
dantly shown, the sane and responsible action of the 
mind depends upon a sound and undisturbed condi- 
tion of the brain ; and if Alcohol, when taken into the 
system in but slight quantity, fastens upon this organ 
by especial attraction, and primarily, too, upon its cere- 
bral portion, we should expect to find a disturbance of 
mental operations among the very first effects of the 
ingestion of Alcoholic Liquors. And that such is 
the.fact, few can fail to have observed in this country, 



PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. 101 

where drinking is so common a usage. Indeed, in 
the Psycological phenomena which follow the intro- 
duction of the stimulant into the system, we have ad- 
ditional and convincing proof of the doctrine that the 
mind's instrument is the earliest and chief object of 
Alcoholic attack. It is important that we note care- 
fully the nature of this first deviation from the due 
and healthful course of intellectual activity which is 
induced by the employment of small qantities of spir- 
ituous liquors. 

115. Unequal action of Alcohol upon the Mental 
Faculties. — Says Dr. Eay :* " The first effect of Alco- 
holic Liquors is to exalt the general sentiment of self- 
satisfaction, and diffuse an unusual serenity over the 
mind. The intellectual powers act with increased 
vigor, the individual feels an exhilaration of spirits, a 
sense of warmth and gayety, and his imagination is 
crowded with" delightful images. The sight and hear- 
ing are very slightly affected, a low humming sound 
is heard in the pauses of conversation, and objects are 
enveloped in a slight mist, which prevents them from 
being seen distinctly. Thus far there is no appear- 
ance of drunkenness." It will be noticed that oui 
author in the preceding quotation, states that the In- 
tellectual Powers act with increased vigor, yet he men- 
tions the imagination, as if it might be the object of 

* Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity p. 435. 



102 MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 

special and primary excitement. Accordingly we find 
that the Imaginative and Ideal powers — the creative 
and combining faculties which give rise to sallies of 
wit, and that mental effervescence which is so much 
prized in social and convivial circles — seem to be first 
provoked to unusual activity by the working of the 
stimulant in the Brain. We thus understand how it 
is that, in all ages, persons of brilliant imaginative 
gifts, Poets, Painters, Novelists, Musicians, Orators, 
have, as a class, been especially characterized by their 
devotions to Bacchus. The history of these men has 
been but too often a brief and mournful one. They 
at first used but small quantities of the stimulant ; but 
the amount that sufficed at first to kindle the scintil- 
lations of Genius soon failed. By an inexorable Phys- 
iological Law, the amount of the stimulant necessary 
to produce the desired effect, must be steadily increased 
until at length the exhausted nervous and vital ener- 
gies utterly break down, and the victims descend to a 
premature grave. The high Eeflective and Eeasoning 
powers, the Memory and Judgment, are not thus 
quickened by Alcoholic stimulation. Indeed, that 
spontaneous mental activity which it is the tendency 
of Alcohol to excite, is unfavorable to the exercise of 
the observing and purely reasoning faculties, or to 
the steady concentration of thought upon subjects of 
difficult or profound investigation. Hence we find that 
the greater part of that intellectual labor which has 



PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. 103 

most extended the domain of human knowledge, has 
been performed by men of remarkable sobriety of 
habit — many of them having been constant water- 
drinkers, 

116. This earliest disturbance of the Mind's action is 
Insanity. — I quote at this point the significant words 
of Dr. Carpenter.* " The state of Mental excitement 
just described, is very similar to the incipient stage 
OF phrenitis, or mania. It is not a uniform exalta- 
tion of the Mental powers, but, in some degree a per- 
version of them ; for, that voluntary control over the 
current of thought which is the distinguishing char- 
acter of the sane Mind of Man, is considerably weak- 
ened, so that the heightened Imagination and enlivened 
fancy have more unrestricted exercise; and, while 
ideas and images succeed each other in the Mind with 
marvelous readiness, no single train of thought can 
be carried out with the same continuity as in the state 
of perfect sobriety. This weakening of the vol- 
untary control over the mental operations, 
must be regarded, then, as an incipient stage of 



117. Effects of Alcohol upon the Mind, in intoxicating 
doses. — As the Alcoholic potations are increased, and 
intoxication comes on, the disorder and aberation of 

* Use and abuse of Alcohol, p. 11. 



104 MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 

Mind become palpable to all. The power of control- 
ling the direction of the thoughts is completely lost ; 
ideas flow with confused and incoherent rapidity ; the 
Mind is crowded with phantoms and strange images, 
or possessed by delusions and hallucinations. For ex- 
ample, the Inebriate is apt to imagine either that he 
has offended some one, and shows a ludicrous anxiety 
to apologize ; or, that he has been offended, and fixes 
upon some one as the object of his maledictions, per- 
haps, his blows. He confounds one person with an- 
other. His perceptions of form, distance, number, get 
utterly confused ; the sensations are disturbed ; there 
is ringing in the ears; double -vision, lights burn all 
colors in succession ; and there is oppression, dizziness 
and swimming of the head. The moral faculties are 
equally perverted, and work out all possible discord- 
ances. Some become jubilant and boisterous, and 
others sad and melancholy. Some are mellowed down 
into the foolishest good-nature ; others it makes sour, 
ill-tempered, jealous, suspicious and quarrelsome. 
Some leak out improper truths ; and others rain lies 
upon all around. The moral powers are marked by a 
distorted, if not indeed by an inverted action. In the 
loss of the Mind's balance, as the high controlling fac- 
ulties of reason and judgment gradually break down 
and lose their governing energy, the lower animal 
propensities and all the baser passions of Human Na- 
ture, are stimulated to unwonted activity. As clear- 



PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. 105 

sighted rationality relaxes its grasp upon the helm of 
Human Conduct, it is seized by blind and unregulated 
passion. The Mental excitement here takes the form 
of Delirium. 

118. Delirum Ebriosum, or Drunken Madness. — Con- 
sidering that the state of intoxication is itself, strictly 
speaking, a transient paroxysm of insanity, it can ex- 
cite no surprise that a confirmed state of Mental de- 
rangement should frequently result from the repeti- 
tion of the cause which produces the single paroxysm. 
There are, in fact, some individuals in whom a fit of 
positive madness which persists for some little time 
after the immediate effects of the stimulus have sub- 
sided, is brought on by every excess in drinking. The 
head becomes extremely hot ; the face flushed ; the 
pulse very frequent, full and hard ; the temper is ex- 
cessively violent, the individual sometimes attacking 
every one who comes in his way, and being always 
prone to ferocity against any one who opposes him ; 
and, all sense of danger being lost, he is not deterred 
from violence by the fear of personal injury, but 
rushes madly upon what may prove his destruction. 
This condition is obviously an exaggeration of one of 
the ordinary forms of excitement in common intoxi- 
cation. The frequent repetition of this paroxysm — 
of which, as of ordinary drunkenness, the stimulating 
action of Alcohol on the nervous centres, must be re- 
5* 



106 MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 

garded as the immediate cause — is almost certain, like 
the recurrence of regular maniacal paroxysms, to end 
in some settled form of Insanity. (Dr. Carpenter.) 

119. Delirium Tremens, or Delirum with Tremors. — 
Those who are addicted to the habitual use of Alco- 
holic mixtures, are also liable to another form of ner- 
vous or Brain disease, which is commonly known, 
from one of its most marked symptoms — the peculiar 
tremor of the limbs, — as Delirium Tremens. This state 
is, in many respects, the opposite of the preceding. 
There is little or no heat of the head, or flushing of 
the face ; the skin is cold and humid, and even chilly. 
The pulse, though frequent, is small and weak ; and 
the temper, though very irritable, is not violent ; 
the permanent disposition, indeed, being anxiety and 
apprehension of injury or danger. There is an almost 
entire want of sleep ; and even, if repose be attained, 
it is very imperfect, being interrupted by frightful 
dreams. On the other hand, the waking state is so 
disturbed by illusions of a disagreeable or frightful 
nature, that it differs but little from that of sleep, save 
in the partial consciousness of external things. (Car- 
penter.) The victims of this terrible malady are sus- 
picious, mistrustful, and subject to constant fears and 
alarms, They have disordered conceptions of intense 
and bewildering vividness, which, it is true, they 
sometimes regard as delusions, but oftener mistake 



PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. 107 

for realties, and act accordingly. Their passions, par- 
ticularly those of fear, jealousy, and anger, have an 
uncontrollable mobility, their desires and aversions are 
equally morbid, and the will displays a wild and sleep- 
less energy of action. One of the most common hal- 
lucinations, is that of seeing devils, fiends, snakes, 
spiders, vermin, and all manner of offensive and un- 
clean things, peopling every nook and corner of the 
apartment with their loathsome presence, creeping 
upon the bed-clothes, or crawling over the naked flesh. 
Inspired by the terror of these delusions, the wretched 
patient often attempts self-destruction. He is frequently 
under the illusion of being pursued and hunted by 
mortal foes, and sometimes, confounding his wife or 
attendant with his enemies, he murders them. 

120. Cause of Delirium Tremens. — This terrible 
state, too, is but the manifestation of the disordered 
condition to which the Brain has been brought by 
the habitual use of Alcohol, and plainly exhibits the 
complete perversion of its functional power, and of 
its nutritive operations. It may be the result of ner- 
vous exhaustion, such as occurs at the end of a pro- 
longed debauch ; or, it may occur from want of the 
stimulant, and is then no less due to the previously 
prostrate condition of the nervous system, which 
nothing but the renewal of the potent stimulus can 
excite to any thing like regular action. Delirium 



108 MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 

Tremens, also, frequently comes on as a consequence 
of habitual tippling, many having been the subjects 
of its attack who never drank to intoxication. The 
cause, however, in these instances is quite the same, 
the gradual undermining and subversion of the Cere- 
bral energies by altered and defective Brain nutrition. 

121. Dipsomania, or Oinomania. — There is another 
species or form of mania, with peculiar manifestations, 
which has been termed Dipsomania, or Oinomania. 
Esquirol regards it as the consequence of pathological 
changes in the Brain, and does not consider its un- 
happy subjects as responsible beings. " The patient is 
incessantly under the most overwhelming desire for 
stimulants. He will disregard every impediment, sac- 
rifice comfort and reputation, withstand the claims of 
affection, consign his family to misery and disgrace, 
and deny himself the common necessaries of life, to 
gratify his insane propensity. In the morning, morose 
and fretful, disgusted with himself and dissatisfied 
with all around him, weak and tremulous, incapable 
of any exertion either of mind or bodjr, his first feel- 
ing is a desire for stimulants, with every fresh dose of 
which, he recovers a certain degree of vigor, both of 
body and mind, till he feels comparatively comfort- 
able. A few hours pass without the craving being so 
strong ; but it soon returns, and the patient drinks till 
intoxication is produced. Then succeed the restless 



PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. 109 

sleep, the suffering, the comparative tranquility, the 
excitement, and the state of insensibility ; and, unless 
absolutely secluded from all means of gratifying the 
propensity, the patient continues the same course till 
he dies, or becomes imbecile. It must be remarked, 
that, in all these forms of the disease, the patient is 
perfectly incapable of self-control ; that he is impelled, 
by an irresistible impulse, to gratify his propensity ; 
that, while the paroxysm is on him, he is regardless 
of his health, his life, and all that can make life dear 
to him ; that he is prone to dissipate his property, and 
easily becomes the prey of the designing ; and that, in 
many cases, he exhibits a propensity to commit homi- 
cide or suicide. Ife is thus dangerous to himself and 
others ; and, however responsible he may have been 
for bringing the disease on himself, his responsibility 
ceases as soon as he comes under the influence of the 
malady. Of the Chronic form, I have seen only one 
case completely cured, and that after a seclusion of 
two years' duration. In general, it is not cured ; and 
no sooner is the patient liberated (from the asylum)than 
he manifests all the symptoms of the disease."* (Dr. 
Hutcheson.) The same type of disorder in the nervous 
system, though with lower intensity, is oftentimes seen 
in common drunkards, where the appetite is subject to 

* Report of the Glasgow Lunatic Asylum for 1842. 



110 MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 

periods and paroxysms, with lulls of greater or less 
duration, in which it slumbers. 

122. Alcohol a leading cause of insanity. — Beside 
these distinctive aspects of madness, the use of Alco- 
holic mixtures is also a frequent cause of Insanity in 
its common forms ; that is, of settled mental derange- 
ment. Dr. Beck, in his work upon Medical Jurispru- 
dence, in enumerating the causes which lead to Insan- 
ity, mentions first, " repeated intoxication ;" and med- 
ical men generally, regard Intemperance as among the 
most prominent and effective of the influences which 
induce permanent mental alienation. Great pains 
have been taken by the Superintendents of Lunatic 
Asylums to ascertain the relative frequency of the 
various causes which have operated to produce the In- 
sanity of their inmates ; and the results have been em- 
bodied in statistical forms. The proportion of the 
insane, whose condition is attributed to intemperance, 
varies greatly in different countries, localities and 
periods, ranging from ten to twenty -five, and even, in 
some cases, reaching to fifty per cent. When we re- 
fer, however, to other assigned causes of Insanity, 
" Vice and Sensuality," " Bodily Disorders," " Hered- 
itary Predisposition," " Moral Causes," &c, we are 
justified in suspecting that Alcohol has had a far 
larger agency in the matter than the figures would at 
first seem to allow. 



PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. Ill 

123. There are two kinds of causes which act to pro- 
duce disease in the human body. The first are Predis- 
posing Causes and " their action upon the system is that 
of slowly and imperceptably modifying its nutritive oper- 
ations so as gradually to alter the Chemical, Physical, 
and, thereby, the Vital properties of the fabric; and 
thus to prepare it for being acted on by causes which, in 
the healthy condition, pruduce no influence. 11 The others 
are Exciting causes, which act promptly and directly 
upon the system in producing disease. Now, in the 
light of preceding facts, every one will see that the 
habitual use of Alcohol is a most powerful predispos- 
ing cause of Insanity. It impairs the Mind's stamina, 
and thus gives double effect to all the gusts and 
shocks of life, which tend to prostrate reason. We 
have hence the clear right to conclude that, in very 
numerous cases, where Insanity has been set down to 
other causes, its foundations were long before laid by 
intemperance. In estimating the relative proportion 
of intemperance to other causes, particularly in those 
Asylums which derive their inmates from the middle 
and higher classes of society, we must not forget that 
the delicacy of friends would incline them to conceal 
the nature of the patient's previous habits, and attrib- 
ute his disorder entirely to causes from which it has 
seemed immediately to proceed. It is the result of 
careful calculation, and probably far within the truth, 
that one-fourth of all the wrecking of Mind that our 



112 MENTAL DISORDER AND INSANITY 

Asylums report, is due to the single cause of intemper- 
ance. 

124. Inebriates transmit Mental disorders to their off- 
spring. — No fact of Nature is better established in 
common observation than the transmission of qualities 
and peculiarities from Parent to offspring. Diseases 
are also hereditary, as we have all seen, or may see, 
in cases of Scrofula, Consumption, and various other 
maladies. Predisposition to Insanity is also, as is well 
known, hereditary. Conditions of nervous weakness 
and Brain disease, are thus transmissible ; and so, too, 
is the peculiar condition of the Nervous and Cerebral 
system of the drunkard. It is a fact of terrible im- 
port, and which we cannot too thoroughly ponder, 
that the Inebriate transmits to his offspring that pecu- 
liar disordered state of the nervous mechanism which 
causes a demand and a craving for stimulants ; he 
transmits a ready-made and constitutional appetite for 
Alcoholic poison. The habitual drunkard also trans- 
mits to his children strong tendencies to Insanity and 
Idiocy. In a report on Idiocy made by Dr. Howe to the 
Legislature of Massachusetts, we find the following as- 
tounding statement: " The habits of the parents of three 
hundred of the Idiots were learnt; and a hundred and 
forty -five, or nearly one-half, are reported as l known 
to be habitual drunkards!' Such parents, it is af- 
firmed, give a weak and lax constitution to their chil- 



PRODUCED BY ALCOHOL. 113 

dren, who are, consequently, ' deficient in bodily and 
vital energy,' and predisposed, by their very organiza- 
tions, to have cravings for Alcoholic stimulants ; many 
of these children are feeble, and live irregularly. 
Having a lower vitality, they feel the want of some 
stimulation. If they pursue the course of their fathers, 
which they have more temptation to follow and less 
power to avoid than the children of the temperate, 
they add to their hereditary weakness, and increase 
the tendency to idiocy in their constitution ; and this 
they leave to their children after them."* 

125. Such is a dense and too hasty record of the 
workings of Alcohol in the Human Brain — a demon- 
stration of the high antagonism which it sustains to 
the intellectual principle in man. In all its countless 
forms and guises, in small quantities and in large, it 
is ever the inveterate adversary of Mind. And in 
thus disorganizing the Intellectual and Moral powers, 
a calamity is wrought which reaches all the relations 
of human nature. Conduct and Character have been 
completely revolutionized. The outward world is 
dislocated and ajar. All things have been jostled 
out of their true relations and positions. Nothing is 
seen aiight. The man is unmanned. He is a changed 
being. What we formerly expected of him, we now 
no longer look for. The conduct which, in his previ- 

* American Journal of Medical Sciences, April, 1849. p. 437. 



114 APPETITE FOR ALCOHOL. 

ous state, we should have characterized as extrava- 
gant, is now natural and expected. We hear that a 
stranger has been insulted or assaulted in the public 
way ; or, that a stage- driver has run over a child in 
the street, or upset his vehicle, and mutilated the in- 
mates; or, that an engineer has smashed up a train of 
passengers ; or, that a husband has abused or killed 
his wife, and we instinctively ask, if the perpetrators 
of these acts were not intoxicated. Such transactions 
belong fitly and properly to the drunken or insane 
state. We pronounce such acts " monstrous," but 
they are only so when considered as resultants of the 
action of sane and responsible Minds. To him, with 
the distempered Brain and shattered intellect, they 
are not monstrous, but legitimate and natural. 

XYI. INTENSITY OF THE APPETITE FOE 
ALCOHOL. 

126. As it is the province of Alcohol to disaffect 
that portion of the human constitution which is 
appointed to preside over all the rest, as it carries dis- 
order upward among the primal and executive forces 
of life, we discover how deep-seated among the 
springs and impulsions of action, is the mischief it 
works. When the nervous system has been long 
plied with this fiery, irritant poison, scourged through 
a succession of paroxysms and prostrations, until its 



APPETITE FOR ALCOHOL. 115 

naturae elastic, and sustaining energy is departed, 
how intense must be the demand for more of the po- 
tent stimulant, to bring that system up to anything 
like its normal condition ! In consequence of the 
Brain having been so much accustomed to artificial 
stimulus, according to a well known law of the ani- 
mal economy, it becomes incapable of an effort, with- 
out the aid of this stimulus, which is necessary to the 
performance of even its most ordinary exercise. 
Drinking thus becomes, we might almost say, an 
indispensable habit. The will is clogged and encum- 
bered and broken down by an appetite for liquor, 
which may be the result of a morbid and diseased 
condition of body.' 

127. " Obviously," writes an able and acute physi- 
cian, u as these pathological changes (of the Brain) 
are the effect of a long continued, voluntary habit, 
there is strong evidence in favor of the idea, that they, 
in turn, become efficient causes, and act powerfully in 
maintaining this habit, even in spite of the resistance 
of the will. So deplorably common has drunkeness 
become in this country, that there are few who have 
not seen the melancholy spectacle of the most power- 
ful motives, the most solemn promises and resolutions, 
a constant sense of shame and danger, bodily pain 
and chastisement, the prayers and supplications of 
friendship, of as little avail in reforming the drunkard, 



116 APPETITE FOR ALCOHOL. 

as they would be in averting an attack of fever or 
consumption. With a full knowledge of the dread- 
ful consequences to fortune, character and family, he 
plunges on in his mad career, deploring, it may be, with 
unutterable agony of spirit, the resistless impulse by 
which he is mastered." 

128. A case in/point — In an instance mentioned by 
Dr. Mc. Msh, the Inebriate replied to the remonstran- 
ces of his friends, who painted the distress of his fami- 
ly, the loss of his business and character, and the ruin 
of his health : u My good friends, your remarks are 
just ; they are, indeed, too true, but I can no longer 
resist the temptation. If a bottle of brandy stood at 
one hand, and the pit of Hell yawned at the other, and 
I were convinced that I should be pushed in as soon 
as I took one glass, I could not refrain! You are very 
kind. I ought to be grateful for so many kind good 
friends : but you may spare yourselves the trouble of 
trying to reform me ; the thing is out of the ques- 
tion." And the thing probably was out of the ques- 
tion. The habit had so vitiated the organs of mind, 
and the depraved organs had so reacted on the habit, 
that each had become bound to the other by bonds 
that death alone could sunder. 

129, We are told that thousands have been reclaim- 
ed from this vice by influences applied to the mind 
and conscience ; but what large numbers have also 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 117 

been swept backward by morbid impulses which they 
could not'resist! How many, too, who have shatter- 
ed their nervous organization by the use of Alcohol, 
upon a change of habit, fly to opium, and the immod- 
erate use of every stimulating principle of diet ! And 
of those who, through strength and fidelity of pur- 
pose, have abandoned intoxicating courses, how few 
dare we proclaim safe, or could trust in the crisis of 
temptation ! Experience is continually teaching the 
mournful lesson that such are never beyond the reach 
of danger. These facts powerfully teach us that, in 
the reformatory management of Inebriate classes, va- 
rious innocent stimuli should be skilfully substituted 
for the baser stimulation of liquor. 

XVII. RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

130. I cannot dismiss the subject of the relations 
of Alcohol to the Brain and its offices without offer- 
ing some suggestions concerning the responsibilities 
of the inebriated condition. The highly interesting 
nature of the inquiry, its great importance, which 
has not hitherto been sufficiently pressed upon public 
attention, and the vital practical bearing which sev- 
eral of its considerations have upon the practice of our 
communitjr, induces me somewhat to amplify a dis- 
cussion which was cut short in the previous edition 
of this work, by the sickness of the Author. This is, 
also, the fittest place to treat the question : the scien- 



118 RESPONSIBILITY IN" DRUNKENNESS. 

tine views unfolded in the preceding pages being 
indispensable to a clear understanding of it. It is 
the almost universal complaint of late writers upon 
Medical Jurisprudence, that in the adjustment of the 
rights and relations of the Insane, law has not kept 
pace with either science or humanity ; that legislation 
remains to-day nearly as it has stood for hundreds of 
years, the exponent of a blind and prejudiced public 
sentiment, and an imbroglio of contradictions and 
absurdities. We are to find that these strictures are 
applicable to at least one department of the subject. 

131. Agreement of Science and Experience. — It has 
been proved in the foregoing pages, that Alcohol, 
when taken into the system, is carried to the brain, — 
seeks that organ by a fixed law of local attraction, 
and so disorganizes it as to unsettle and disorder the 
intellect. Furthermore, that it produces this effect in 
various degrees, and by successive and insidious steps ; 
from the first gentle jar of mental and passional ac- 
cord, through all the stages of dissonance and derange- 
ment, to the ravings of ungovernable madness or the 
death-stupor of complete narcotism. Also, that in 
thus subverting the intellectual and moral nature, 
Alcohol acts by destroying the normal balance of its 
faculties: weakening, embarrassing and suspending the 
higher governing attributes, whilst it imparts preter- 
natural vigor to the lower passions, often arousing 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 119 

them to blind and headlong violence. Finally, 
that this terrible change, at the same time that it 
diminishes responsibility, heightens and strengthens 
all the tendencies to crime. From the facts that have 
been thus established concerning the nature of Alco- 
hol and its effects upon the human constitution, 
science declares that it must increase the criminal 
dispositions of men, and greatly multiply their capaci- 
ties of evil. And now, what is the reality of common 
and universal experience ? What are the actual facts 
concerning this matter, as witnessed in society by 
observers of the largest opportunity ; those whose 
professional and constant dealings have been with 
crime in every -form, who have explored its laby- 
rinths and breathed its* air — judges, sheriffs, prison- 
wardens, jailers, police-magistrates and constables? 
What say these to the relation between the general 
use of Alcoholic liquor in community and the propor- 
tion of crime? We have space only for a bare sam- 
ple of testimony that might be accumulated into 
volumes. 

W. Edmonds, warden of the New York City prison, says, " Nearly 
three-fourths of the entire number of prisoners (in 1849) were com- 
mitted for offences or misfortunes palpably and directly caused by 
the use of intoxicating liquors." Again he says, " Two hundred and 
thirty-one lunatics were temporarily under the care of the prison 
physician ; in at least one-half these cases alcohol had usurped the 
! throne of reason.' " 

Oscar Tyler, Sheriff of Albany county, says, in 1851, that " It is a 



120 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

safe calculation that eight-tenths of all the persons committed to the 
Albany County Jail, in the past year, were in consequence of the sale 
and use of rum." 

Seth Clark, jailer of Buffalo, says, "During the several years that. I 
have kept the jail and been intimately connected with the criminal 
courts of this county, nine-tenths of all the crime committed has had 
its origin in intemperance." 

J. 0. Cole and S. H. H. Parsons, Police Justices of Albany, state 
as a matter of opinion, " That more than three-fourths of all the 
offences committed are the result of the use of intoxicating drinks." 

David N. Leaman, of Poughkeepsie, Sheriff, says, " So far as crime 
is concerned, I am satisfied from three years' observation, that of the 
whole number committed to this jail, four-fifths are intemperate, and 
their crime is immediately or indirectly the effect of this propensity." 

P. A. Child, Police Justice of the city of Buffalo in 1850, says, 
" My opinion, matured by daily observation for a limited number of 
years, is, that intemperance is the cause, either proximate or remote, 
of seven-tenths of all the crimes brought to my notice." 

The Sheriff of Niagara county, says " That at least three-fourths 
of the petty offences have been committed while under the influence 
of intoxicating liquor." 

E. L. Porter, "Warden of the Sing-Sing State Prison, says, "It is an 
every-day occurrence, that convicts say to me that they were drunk 
when they committed the crime for which they are now suffering." The 
above facts are from an official report to the New York Legislature. 

In 1848, the keeper of the prison in Hartford, Conn., was asked, 
" What proportion of commitments owe their origin to intemperance ?" 
He replied, " Ninety per cent." To the same inquiry, the keeper of 
the prison at Norwich replied, " Seventy-five per cent." 

So that the' statement of Sir Matthew Hale, made two hundred 
years ago, expresses the truth of to-day, that " If all the murders and 
manslaughters, and burglaries and robberies, and riots and tumults, 
and other great enormities which had been committed during the 
twenty years of his observation, were divided into five parts, four 
would be found to have been the result of intemperance." 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 121 

Our experience is also that of England. Tile effect of Alcohol upon 
man is not an affair of latitude and longitude. 

"Judge Wightmau stated, in his address to the grand jury at 
Liverpool,, in 1846, that •• he found, from a perusal of the depositions, 
that one unfailing cause of four-ffths of these crimes was, as it was 
in every other calendar, the besetting sin of drunkenness." Judge 
Alderson, when addressing the grand jury in 1844, at the York assizes, 
said : "Another thing he would advert to was, that a great portion 
of the crimes to be brought forward for their consideration, arose 
from the vice of drunkenness alone ; indeed, if they took away from 
the calendar all those cases with which drunkenness has any connec- 
tion, they would make the large calendar a very small one." Judge 
Erskine declared at the Salisbury assizes in 1844, when sentencing a 
gentleman to six months' hard labor, for a crime committed through 
strong drink, that ninety-nine cases out of every hundred were from 
the same cause. Judge Coleridge likewise stated at the Oxford as- 
sizes, " that he never knew a case brought before him that was not 
directly or indirectly connected with intoxicating liquors." And 
Judge Patterson, at the Norwich assizes, said to the grand jury : " If 
it were not for this drinking, you and I would have nothing to do." 
One of the judges stated some time ago, at the Circuit Court in Glas- 
gow, that " more than eighty criminals had been tried and sentenced 
to punishment ; and that, with scarcely a single exception, the whole 
of the crimes had been committed under the influence of intoxicating 
liquors. From the evidence that appeared before him as a judge, it 
seemed that every evil in Glasgow began and ended in whiskey/' 

It was the opinion of all the witnesses of various grades in the Brit- 
ish Naval Service, examined before an admiralty committee, which 
had in charge the subject of the issue of spirit-rations, that a state of 
either actual intoxication, or of irritability arising out of half-drunk- 
enness, is the immediate cause of from three-fourths to nixe-tenths 
of all the punishments which it is found necessary to inflict on board a 
ship of war." 

The English " Government Gazette" informs us that the troops of 
the Madras Presidency were divided into three classes : teetotallers, 



122 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

temperate, and intemperate. The amount of punishment that it was 
found necessary to inflict upon the teetotallers, in proportion to the 
number of individuals, was but two-fifths that of the temperate, and 
less than one-seventh that incurred by the intemperate ; and, besides, 
most of the offences committed by the teetotallers were of the most 
trivial kind, such us could be at once punished by the officers ; while, 
among the temperate, and more especially among the intemperate, a 
very large proportion of the offences were of so high a grade, that 
they could be disposed of only by regimental courts-martial. 

Still further evidence that Alcohol is a cause of crime, is afforded 
by the conduct of communities under the two systems — the unre- 
strained use of Alcoholic liquors, and compulsory abstinence from 
them, as in Maine. The Mayor of Portland reports that the number 
of commitments to the jail of Portland, for crime, from Jan. 1st to 
Dec. 1st of 1850, the year prior to the Law, was 192 ; for the corre- 
sponding months subsequent to its enactment, 89 ; but of these, 58 
were liquor-sellers imprisoned, leaving but 31 against 192. 

In Bangor, the commitments for crime in three months sank from 
19 to 8 ; in Lowell, Mass., the criminal business of the police-court 
was reduced, in three months, (excluding liquor cases,) thirty-eight 
per cent. ; in Providence, R. L, the commitments for crime for the first 
three months of the prohibiting law, sank from 161 to 99 ; they were 
one-third less than the corresponding months of the preceding year. 
(Mayor's Report.) 

Levi Underwood, State's Attorney of Chittenden Co., Vt., says : 
" Within this town, from December 1st, 1852, until March 7th, 1853, com- 
plaints were made to me almost daily for breaches of the peace ; and 
on investigation I was satisfied that nine-tenths of the crime com- 
mitted during that time were caused by drunkenness ; from the 8th oi 
March to July 7th two complaints only have been made for such 
offences, and but one was caused by drunkenness." 

132. These facts show that the unrestricted use of 
alcohol in society augments crime at a rapid rate, and 
that its diminished employment at once manifests its 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 123 

effect in the reduction of crime. They show that it 
is'the nature of Alcohol to pervert the deepest springs 
of character, to dislodge the responsible soul, and hurl 
its victims headlong athwart the peace and security 
of society. They demonstrate that it changes the 
nature of man for the worse, turns it in a vicious 
direction, doubling, trebling, and quadrupling its 
crime-inducing tendencies. 

133. Dr. Huss's Experiment. — The evidence upon 
this point is overwhelmingly conclusive, yet I cannot 
forbear introducing an account of an experiment which 
strikingly corroborates the view now taken. It was 
made by Dr. Huss, a distinguished physician of Stock- 
holm, in Sweden, who first described a terrible malady 
which he called the "Chronic Alcohol-disease," (Alco- 
holismus Chronicus,) of which he observed 139 cases 
in two years in a single hospital. Dr. Huss attributed 
this malady to the constant presence of Alcohol-poison 
in the blood ; it being taken in frequent yet moderate 
doses, insufficient to produce apparent intoxication. 
It was objected that the dreadful derangement of the 
system produced by this disease was not the effect of 
Alcohol, but of the drugs and poisons with which the 
liquor was contaminated. He instituted the following 
experiment, to test this objection. It will serve us a 
double purpose: 

" During eight months, he administered daily to three dogs of vari- 
ous ages, but of nearly equal size, six ounces of Swedish brandy. To 



124 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

one the purified brandy was given ; but to the other two, the spirit 
was given unrefined, and consequently in the state in which it is gen- 
eraly consumed by the working-classes in Stockholm. This difference 
in the quality of the spirit produced no diversity in the symptoms 
exhibited by the three animals. Intoxication and intense thirst were 
occasioned by each dose during the first three months ; but the dogs 
continued fat and apparently well. In the fourth month the bark of 
the animals became hoarse ; they had a dry cough ; the eyes were 
staring and full of tears ; hearing was much deadened, and the animals' 
sleep became restless, with frequent jerkings of the limbs. After the 
completion of the fourth month, the dogs trembled when they attempted 
to stand, their walk was shuffling, and there was evident weakness 
of the extremities, especially in the hind legs, so that they often 
remained in a sitting posture when taking food. Cramps and con- 
vulsive movements next appeared in the extremities and in the trunk, 
both during sleep and when the animals were awake, lying on their 
sides. The sight of other dogs, however, roused them at all times from 
their apathetic condition, and they endeavored, even in their weakened 
state, to attach and bite them. The powers of the animals diminished 
more and more as the administration of the Alcohol was persevered 
in, and the sensibility of the skin, especially that of the ears, was 
remarkably lessened. The appetite now fell off rapidly ; but the 
irritability towards other dogs eontinued unabated to the last. No 
diminution of the deposit of fat beneath the skin was observed j it 
had even rather increased at the period of death, which in all three 
occurred about the eighth month."* 

Thus the legitimate effect of Alcohol in this case 
was to excite and provoke the more vicious qualities 
of the animals, as evinced by their attempts to attack 
and bite other dogs, even in an advanced stage of 
weakness and apathy. 

134. Moderate Drinking disposes to Crime. — We must 

* Carpenter's Physiology of Temperance, p. 25. 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 125 

not commit the error of supposing that this mass of 
crime which is charged to Alcohol was all committed 
by persons in the matured stages of intoxication or 
drunkenness. There can be no worse mistake than 
such an idea. There are numerous offences which are 
committed under the influence of just enough Alcohol 
to excite the feelings and make the temper irritable, 
so that the individual is easily provoked to acts of vio- 
lence by causes which, under other circumstances, 
would be unheeded. There is an irascibility of half- 
drunkenness which is most propitious for quarrels. 
How many duels and deaths have sprung from the 
touchy temper of men " flushed with wine," by which 
the " honor" was made doubly tender and susceptible ! 
With the commencement of the action of the cause is 
the commencement of the effect. With the beginning 
of drinking is the beginning of the necessary conse- 
quences of drinking. Moderate drinking is but in- 
cipient drunkenness. We may name the various 
stages of effects produced by Alcohol upon the mind, 
to suit our taste : the slang nomenclature of the bar- 
room is peculiarly rich — but it is time to understand 
that these differences are only degrees of the" same 
thing. We are not at liberty to make thickness of 
speech and zig-zag pedestrian movements the neces- 
sary signs of drunkenness. The mind gives way 
before the muscles — the man falls intellectually long 
before he falls physically. Drinking has other conse- 



126 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

quences besides the ultimate empty pockets and invest- 
ment of rags. 

135. The Engineer who steps from his locomotive 
to the "refreshment-room," to procure a draught of 
brandy, goes back to his charge a changed man. He 
may return with as firm a tread and as erect a mien 
as he went; nevertheless, he is no longer the man he 
was. The train has virtually exchanged Engineers. 
Indeed, between the Engineer without the brandy, and 
him with it, there may be a far wider difference than 
would be found between two different men. His bran- 
died blood whirls through the system with unnatural 
speed. It stimulates him. Literally stimulus signifies 
a goad ; so that the brandy goads, pricks, or spurs the 
organism into excitement. Brain and thought par- 
take of the stimulation — are quickened. As the blood 
flies faster and the brain thinks faster, so he is alto- 
gether a 'faster' man, and will be very likely to run a 
faster train; and there are a thousand contingences in 
which the destruction of the train and of a score of lives 
might be accounted for by this difference in the men- 
tal condition of the engineer. The general use of 
steam-power in society, by momentarily suspending 
the fate of numberless thousands of human beings 
upon coolness of head, clearness of eye, and steadiness 
of hand, has added to this subject an element of 
alarming interest. 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 127 

136. Alcohol increases Grime by destroying Reason. — 
It would seem, then, from these various considera- 
tions, that we can regard Alcohol as a source of 
crime only, as it breaks in upon the mental structure, 
subordinates the will, inflames the baser propensities, 
and thus brings on a condition of real insanity. It is 
shown by the experience of society, that in a given 
condition of circumstances the human mind is capable 
of but a certain amount of crime ; and it is only by 
subverting its natural state that Alcohol is capable of 
augmenting it. The free and natural play of the 
human faculties gives rise to only a certain quantity 
of evil, and it is impossible to increase that quantit}^ 
except by the destruction of the mind's order and the 
substitution of new and more potential forces of mis- 
chief. In thus demolishing the mind, and building upon 
its ruins more effective engines of evil, responsibility, 
of course, disappears. Indeed, this is the fundamental 
condition of the victory of Alcohol ; for so long as 
the grounds of responsibility remain — the undisturbed 
exercise of the reason and conscience — so long will 
crime be kept at its lowest point. As in a temperate 
condition of society, crime is restrained within its 
lowest limits by the sense of responsibilit}^ so, if it is 
to be greatly increased, that sense of responsibility 
must first be removed; and this is what Alcohol 
accomplishes. 



128 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

137. Important Testimony. — We therefore recognize 
two species of causes as operative in the production 
of so-called criminal deeds. First, those which we 
may assume to act in the natural course of things, 
which spring from moral depravity, and are subject 
to voluntary control ; and, secondly, those of intem- 
perance — disorganization and disease of the mind's 
organ, which is therefore imparted to the mind itself, 
and thus takes away its freedom. Upon this point I 
may now quote the able testimony of Dr. Carpenter. 
This eminent physiologist and profound student of 
nature has recently revised his important work upon 
Alcohol, from which I have had occasion to make 
repeated extracts. After five years' additional obser- 
vation and reflection, with his mind specially drawn 
to the subject, he has added a chapter in the revised 
edition, upon the subject of "Loss of Moral Control." 
From this chapter I extract the following passages, 
which may be accepted as from the highest scientific 
authority upon this question, perhaps, in the Avorld : 

" To class that moral perversion which leads to criminal conduct, 
among the Diseases of the Nervous System, induced by the action of 
Alcohol, may, at first sight, appear an altogether untenable doctrine ; 
yet a little consideration will show that it is perfectly consistent with 
what is universally admitted as to the primary effect of alcoholized 
blood upon the brain ; for we have seen that its direct tendency is to 
weaken the controlling power of the will, whilst it augments the 
activity of the automatic or impulsive part of our nature ; and when- 
ever the lower feelings and passions have a constitutional or acquired 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 129 

predominance, they will manifest themselves in the conduct, so soon as, 
being themselves inflamed, they are left free, by the temporary annihi- 
lation of voluntary power, from the restraint under which they may 
have been previously kept. But if this be the direct result of the 
occasional action of alcoholized blood upon the brain, it is quite in 
conformity with the principles already laid down, that the nutrition 
of the organ should be so perverted by the habitual presence of Alco- 
hol (though in comparatively small amount) in the blood which 
supplies it, as to produce a progressive degradation of the moral tone, 
by the habitual excitement of the lower propensities, and by the con- 
temporaneous diminution in the power of the will ; so that, at last, 
the wretched victim of intemperance is reduced to a state of complete 
slavery, and no longer has the power, however strong may be his 
desire, to free himself, by a vigorous effort, from the chains which 
have gradually wound themselves around him. His condition, in fact, 
is essentially one of self-induced insanity ; and the entire want of self- 
control which shows itself in his repeated indulgence in what he knows 
to be destructive of his own well-being, leaves him amenable to the 
tyranny of anger, lust, or any other passion which may have either an 
original or an acquired predominance in his nature." 

138. Professor C. J. A. Mittermaier, * a distinguished 
German writer on Medical Jurisprudence, says : 

" The drunken man loses the consciousness of the external world. 
The friend whom in his sober mind he loves is now regarded as an 
enemy, in whose every look he imagines he reads a threat. It is no 
longer in his power to refer what he wills to the law, for the voice of 
reason is silent for him. He no longer knows what he does, and he 
consequently acts without responsibility, because he acts without 
consciousness." 

I might multiply such authorities to any extent, 

* Effeets of Drunkenness upon Criminal Responsibility. See paper in Am. Jurist. 

9 



130 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

but it is needless ; every child knows that a man 
under the influence of Alcohol is not himself; he is be- 
side himself — to all intents and purposes deranged. The 
rule of law as respects the responsibilities of the insane 
is thus stated by an able writer in the American Jurist.* 
u No principle in criminal law is more universally admitted 
than that the insane man is not responsible for his acts; that 
guilt does not attach to the individual who is unconscious 
of his deeds ; that it is the criminal mind, the wicked 
intent, which makes him the subject of punishment" And 
now, what is the earnest and multitudinous voice that 
comes to us from the largest class of offenders in 
court-rooms, jails, State-prisons, and upon the gallows? 
" The crime imputed to us was not in our nature ; we 
never intended the wickedness, and should not have* 
committed it but that we were crazed with drink." 
Will it be pretended that there is no difference between 
the intrinsic criminality of acts originating in these 
circumstances, and such as proceed from settled malig- 
nity of purpose ? 

139. Principle of Law which governs the Case. — But it is 
replied that, conceding the alcoholized state to be a mod- 
ification or species of insanity, still it is self-induced ; 
that inebriation is a state voluntarily brought on, and 
that therefore its subject must be held responsible for 

consequences. This is the popular doctrine ; it is the 

i 

* Vol. iii., p. 6. 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 131 

principle adopted by our courts, and was long ago 
laid down by Lord Coke as the rule of English law* 
which governs the question. "The drunkard," says 
he, "is voluntaries daemon; and whatever ill he 
doth, his drunkenness shall aggravate it." This prin- 
ciple is unsound and indefensible, and the practice to 
which it leads entirely unjust. Voluntary intoxica- 
tion may be regarded as criminal just in proportion to 
the amount of wilfulness or malice which can be 
proved to have inspired the act. This is the univer- 
sally acknowledged test of criminality ; and nothing 
else can be. We are not at liberty to unsettle foun- 
dation-principles by introducing a sliding-scale for the 
measure of guilt; holding the inebriate responsible, 
not for his self-induced sanity, but for the variable and 
accidental consequences to which it may give rise (148.) 

140. Opinion of Judge Story. — Our question is this : 
Is an individual to be held responsible for acts pro- 
ceeding from a disordered state of mind, when and 
because that state is voluntarily brought on ? I shall 
abstain from its discussion, as it will be more satisfac- 
tory to quote the ablest medico-legal authorities ; those 

* The question of the legal liabilities of drunkenness has been very differently 
settled among different nations. The Grecian law awarded a double punishment 
for a crime committed under the influence of inebriation, not only punishing the 
crime, but also the drunkenness that gave rise to it. The Roman law allowed the 
plea of drunkenness in exculpation for acts committed under its influence, except 
in case of women, and these it punished capitally. Similar discrepancy has been 
observed in the legislation of modern states upon the subject. 



132 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

who have written, not in the interest of a doctrine or 
of a party, but for the guidance and enlightenment of 
judges and legislators. Judge Story says: * 

" Many species of insanity arise from what, in a moral point of view, 
is a criminal neglect or fault of the party ; as from religious melan- 
choly, undue exposure, extravagant pride : and yet such insanity has 
always been deemed a sufficient excuse for any crime done under its 
influence." 

141. Dr. Lee, the able editor of Gruy's Forensic 
Medicine, says : 

" Since delirium tremens may be the result of intoxicating liquors 
not taken to intoxication ; and since, in the eye of the law, even drink- 
ing to excess is not criminal ; it is difficult to see wherein acts com- 
mitted during a state of mental derangement thus induced should be 
punishable, any more than those which are the consequences of any 
other habits which are under the control of the individual. Gam- 
bling, commercial speculation, hard study, and a variety of other 
voluntary causes, it is well known, induce insanity; and yet the insane 
person is never regarded as responsible for his actions. In what 
respect, however, does he differ from him whose reason has been 
dethroned by the use of intoxicating drinks ?" 

142. Dr. Drake on Responsibility in Drunkenness. — 
From a very able paperf by the late Dr. Drake, of 
Cincinnati, reviewing a trial which occurred in that 
city, and which has been- very widely quoted, I 
extract the following passages : 

" I would ask whether the court and jury have a right to travel 

* Mason's Reports, vol. v., p. 28. 
■}• See American Jurist, vol, jii., p. 13. 






RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 133 

behind the testimony which establishes the insanity, to inquire into its 
causes, and estimate the culpability of the non compos, not by the 
degree of alienation, but the criminality of those causes? I think 
they have no such right. But if it is correct for them to do it in one 
case, it is equally so in all others ; and whenever insanity is offered 
in defence, its causes should be ascertained, and made to determine 
the guilt of the accused. This, I apprehend, would be a new princi- 
ple in jurisprudence. Let us look at the practice to which it would 
lead. Delirium tremens is sometimes the consequence of the use of 
opium, and frequently results from daily stimulation with ardent 
spirits, without their being ever taken to the extent of intoxication. 
Now, all the acts of a non compos from either of these causes must 
be pardoned, because there is nothing criminal in such a use of stimu- 
lants. Moreover, drunkenness itself is not unlawful 5 and, therefore, 
cannot impart a character of criminality to the actions of him in 
whom it may excite insanity. There are, however, many other causes 
of this malady which are criminal ; such as gambling, duelling, and 
prostitution, all of which should be inquired into, and when found 
real, must, if the principle is adhered to, be made to impart crimi- 
nality to the actions of the non compos. But this, I venture to 
assert, was never done in any country. The truth is, that the im- 
munity from punishment results FROM THE INSANITY ITSELF, 

AND NOT FROM THE NATURE OF THE CAUSE WHICH PRODUCED IT. ? ' 

143. Dr. Ray on Responsibility in Drunkenness* — 

" The whole theory of the English law in regard to drunkenness is 
founded on the fallacy, that because the act of drinking is voluntary, 
the person is responsible for whatever actions it leads him to commit. 
An act that unintentionally leads to the commission of crime is thus 
confounded with such as are deliberately designed to have this effect, 
the distinction being utterly overlooked between what the law calls 
culpa (fault) and dolus (intentional injury or crime). It is difficult to 
conceive why such a confusion of moral and legal distinctions should 

* Medical Jurisprudence of Insanity, p. 453. 1853. 



134 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

be — not overlooked — but actually acknowledged and defended, even 
at the present day. An essential element of crime is the previous 
intention 5 and unless the criminal act is accompanied by wrong 
intentions, the author thereof is regarded by the law of all civilized 
people, and even by the English law, except in a few cases, as guilty 
of culpa, not of dolus. We are not satisfied that there should be an 
exception to this principle, in the case of drunkenness. If a person 
who enters a stable with a lighted candle, not properly protected, 
and carelessly drops it into a haymow, whereby the building is de- 
stroyed, is not deemed guilty of arson ; no more should one who in a 
fit of drunkenness kills a fellow-being, without any previous inten- 
tion so to do, be deemed guilty of murder. True, the fault of drunken- 
ness is far greater than that of carelessness, and consequently should 
be punished with proportionate severity ; but the difference is one 
merely of degree. The doctrine of the common law would have a 
shadow of support, if drunkenness were really a crime of some magni- 
tude ; but it is not so regarded by the laws of England ; and, in most 
parts of this country, it is no crime at all. The free, unembarrassed 
use of the reasoning powers is essential to responsibility ; but while 
the contrary condition of these powers, in insanity, absolves its sub- 
jects from the legal consequences of crime, it is not permitted to have 
the same effect when produced and accompanied by drunkenness. It 
does not seem to be a sufficient reason for this distinction, that in the 
latter case, the loss of moral liberty is the voluntary act of the party, 
while in the former it is the effect of disease. In the first place, the 
only object which the drunkard has in view is animal enjoyment ; 
for the loss of his reason, though a certain result, is not the motive for 
his indulgence ; and, secondly, the very insanity which is admitted in 
excuse for crime may be, as in a very large proportion of cases it 
really is, the result of habits of drunkenness, in which the party has 
voluntarily persisted. Where the moral guilt is very nearly, if not 
precisely equal, it seems unjust that the legal consequences should 
differ so widely as they do, in regard to criminal acts, according aa 
they are committed under the influence of drunkenness, or of that 
insanity which may be one of its direct results." 






RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 135 

144. Position of Government upon the Question, — 
It will be seen by the preceding extracts that, in the 
matter of responsibility in intemperance, Government 
plants itself upon wholy untenable ground. I believe 
that for its persistent error and injustice there is an 
adequate cause. It is involved in a policy of wrong, 
to which its course in this matter is the necessary 
sequel and its only alternative. I wish to bring out 
clearly this important practical point.- My purpose has 
been, not to undermine or explain away individual re- 
sponsibility, but to define its grounds, conditions, and 
limitations ; not to relieve any who may be properly held 
by its obligations, but to hold, all to a more rigid and inex- 
orable account. I affirm, then, that Government has 
found it necessary to depart from a fundamental and self- 
evident principle of law, (138,) in order to hold this 
class of insane people responsible, because it is itself 
directly involved in the business of breaking down human 
reason; of producing, I might almost say manufacturing, 
Idiocy, Mania, Delirium, and Madness. (114-125, 146.) 
If, therefore, it should treat those Insane for whose 
mental condition it is in a large measure itself respon- 
sible, as it does those whose derangement results from 
other causes, holding the former also excused ; then 
the act would rebound upon itself, and it would stand 
directly responsible for all the crimes they might com- 
mit. Being embarked in the vocation of creating in- 
sanity, it seeks to evade responsibility by transfering 



136 KESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

it from itself to its miserable victims. This is a strong 
statement, but it is the strength of truth. 

145. By Government I mean in this case, not an 
abstraction incubating over law-books in our legis- 
lative halls, but the thinking, voting men of these 
States. 



146. The Import of Legal "License" — Governmental 
license of the sale of intoxicating liquors, as beverages, ia 
equivalent to governmental consent to their use as such. 
In permitting for a consideration the sale of these 
liquors, and in demanding what it assumes can be 
obtained — men of proper moral character to engage in 
the business — Government sanctions the purposes for 
which the sale is made, and thus endorses legally and 
morally the habit of drinking. Now we see — all men 
see and know — that " habits of drinking" lead directly 
to "habits of intoxication." Alcoholic liquors, fer- 
mented liquors, long since won their way to the title 
of intoxicating liquors. The use of these stimulants 
naturally grows upon men until it overmasters them. 
Government therefore, in extending to the commerce 
in Alcoholic liquors its specific sanction, endorses its 
legitimate consequences — drinking, drunkenness, mor- 
al vitiation and subversion of reason ; all of which 
flow from the traffic as the stream from its fountain. 
It is vain to urge that Government lends its sanction 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 137 

only to the moderate employment of Alcoholic bever- 
age?, and reprobates their excessive use. This is not 
true. Government neither prohibits drunkenness nor 
objects to it. (148.) It is not chargeable with the 
stupidity of attempting to define the magic line, up to 
which indulgence in the use of Alcoholic liquors is 
safe and commendable, and beyond which it is dan- 
gerous and to be prohibited. No half-way policy 
is here possible. Government must either consent to 
the habit through all its imperceptible degrees of 
growth, or it must entirely interdict it. In this case 
the beginning is every thing. Put out your shoot in 
the soil, and the forces of nature will take care that it 
becomes a tree. Start your drinking habit, and the 
laws of the human constitution will see to it that it 
shall grow and bear fruit after its kind. As the colos- 
sal tree is but the complete evolution of the tiny germ, 
so is confirmed drunkenness but the evolution and 
maturity of the early appetite. And as the microscopic 
germ is yet a rudimental oak, and holds within it the 
slumbering forces which shall make it the glory of the 
forest; so the first slight fondness for intoxicating 
liquors may conceal a latent power of evil which shall 
finally lay the strongest manhood prostrate upon the 
earth. It is preposterous to attempt a defence of 
Government by saying that it only justifies a commence- 
ment of drinking practices. As well might the culprit 
on trial for arson plead innocence, on the ground that 



138 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

he did not burn the dwelling, but only fired a small 
heap of combustibles in the attic. 

147. Reason of the present Course of Government — 
The political necessity for holding the insane re- 
sponsible is thus apparent ; it results naturally from 
the position that Government assumes in reference to 
this matter at the outset. It must either consider 
them as in the fullest sense rational beings, accountable 
for their deeds, or else the vast mass of evil and offence 
to which they give rise will roll back upon itself as a 
result of the approval, encouragement, and protection 
which it extends to liquor- dealing and liquor-drinking; 
for the responsibility exists and must be fixed some- 
where. I believe that it rests largely with the influ- 
ential classes of society who countenance drinking 
usages, and whose opinions take the authoritative form 
of law. It is an easy and compendious method of 
evading the high requirements of this subject our- 
selves, to declare that all is adjusted by visiting upon 
the inebriate's own head the consequences of his mis- 
deeds ; but neither justice nor humanity can be satisfied 
with such a disposition of the case. 

148. Is Drunkenness Crime? — Says the writer to whom 
reference has already been made: "The courts hold 
that drunkenness is in itself a crime; and he who alleges 
it as an excuse, attempts to take advantage of his own. 
wrong." Now, whatever may be the moral aspect of 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 139 

drunkenness, practically and really it is not regarded 
as a crime. Against drunkenness itself, disconnected 
from its accidental consequences, there is no law. 
It is not forbidden by statute, but, to all intents and 
purposes, allowed, licensed. Government considers it 
as not intrinsically a wrong or crime. This is its 
language to community before crime occurs ; but it 
talks differently to the criminal afterwards. James 
Wall and Aaron B. Stookey were not long since exe- 
cuted in New York city for the crime of murder. 
"Your habits of intemperance," said the judge to Wall, 
"have done it ;" and to Stookey, "To drink you owe 
your crime." Now what was the real attitude of 
Government towards these men ? It first said, "You 
may drink. I officially consent to it as a proper 
and innocent thing." They drank and committed 
murder. Government now tells them, as if in mockery 
of all consistency, that drinking is in itself a crime, 
the cause of murder, and the price of their lives.* 
We have been told of legal fictions, and this doc- 
trine must certainly be included among them ; because 
if for a moment mistaken for reality, and carried into 
practice, it might require the adjournment of court 
and jury, with all their retainers and dependants, to 
the State-prison. The bare statement of the princi- 

* It is a startling thought, that while the minister of Government was pronounc- 
ing sentence of death upon these men, a portion of the money which they paid for 
"drink,'' the cause of murder, may have been then in the Government's treasury, 
the price of its endorsement of the habit. 



140 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

pie, that the same class of acts may be passed by nine 
times as innocent, and in the tenth case be found to 
contain enough of criminality to blacken with capital 
guilt the acts of a maniac, sufficiently shows the legal 
confusion in which this question is involved. 

149. Illustration of the present Policy. — What is it 
that we are dailjr doing? A man in a paroxysm of 
drunken madness, when his mind is smitten with 
delusion, and surging with insane excitement, destroys 
a fellow-creature's life : and although the act is ac- 
knowledged to be destitute of the supreme essential 
of criminality, the malice prepense, the deliberate 
malign intent, yet judicial enginery is put in motion, 
the wretch is projected upward to the scaffold, and 
his life strangled out of him with a cord at midday, 
before man and Grod! And yet he whom you 
have just executed for the " crime of drunkenness," 
perhaps inherited from a drunken father a diseased 
nervous system, with a morbid craving for stimulants. 
He found the material to gratify his diseased appetite 
everywhere. It was supplied to him under Govern- 
ment sanction and license. All the influences around 
him seconded the tendencies of his unhealthy consti- 
tution and pressed him to drink. He had seen men 
of all classes in society, from its summits of literary, 
scientific, political, and military eminence, downward 
to the obscure multitude at its base, under the in- 
fluence of alcohol. He knew that the nation's birth- 



RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 141 

day is little else than a grand carnival of public 
drunkenness ; he has himself been intoxicated a hun- 
dred times without molestation ; and it is only when 
surrounded by the death-machinery, that he is first 
made to understand that drunkenness is a crime, and a 
crime of so profound a dye, that even its borrowed 
blackness may stain an otherwise innocent action to so 
sombre a shade, that its author is no longer worthy of 
life. I have not been able to learn that the present 
usage is attempted to be defended on any naked princi- 
ple of justice. The able writer before referred to in 
the American Jurist, in advocating the existing prac- 
tice, speaks of the " considerations of expediency" on 
which the drunkard is made responsible. He proba- 
bly found it impossible to place the question on any 
higher ground. 

150. Alcohol must be a Subject of Law. — It is estab- 
lished by science, that Alcohol, in its relations to the 
human constitution, is a substance of most marked 
individuality, peculiar in its properties, unlike any 
other compound in nature or art, and therefore to be 
dealt with alone, upon the basis of its own distinctive 
and essential character. And, in this thing, science 
only reaffirms, with clearness and power, the virtual 
decision of society in all ages. Alcohol has exerted 
a control over the destiny of countless millions of 
human beings, which has entitled it to recognition and 
a place upon the statute-books of government.. It 



142 RESPONSIBILITY IN DRUNKENNESS. 

has had its own peculiar legislation. There has 
always been a jurisprudence of Alcohol ; there is still ; 
and the necessity for it will continue. But the de- 
mands of the age are for a policy of legislation more 
imbued with its better spirit, and more accordant 
with its advancing knowledge, — for enactments of 
law through which the utmost power of society may 
be put forth to protect the weak and the tempted, and 
guard the young and inexperienced from the all- 
encompassing perils of intemperance. 

151. In this country the people are the architects of 
Government. If the usefulness of the edifice is im- 
paired, or the beauty of its proportions disfigured by 
a decayed and unsightly lean-to, the work of barbaric 
times, let the axe resolutely cleave the worm-eaten 
timbers, and clear the rickety structure to its base. 
With the largest knowledge and the widest experience, 
the latest science and the highest art, a fabric may 
then be reared, whose foundations shall repose in the 
permanence of Justice, and whose walls go upward in 
the strength of Eight. So shall it prove a blessing to 
those who seek its protecting shelter, and coming 
generations pronounce the builders wise. 



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